Hostages
by Insecticon
Summary: (Continues from Life in the Dead End.) What happens when the Decepticons decide to hold an Autobot and her two sparklings hostage on the Nemesis? Total chaos, that's what. Meanwhile, Dave the Vehicon learns about the original Decepticon cause and thinks it might be time for the other Vehicons to transform and rise up - against Megatron. Decepticon Cast x Three OCs.
1. Chapter 1

This story picks up where Life in the Dead End leaves off.

Rated T for adult concepts.

* * *

**_Insecticon Presents_:**

**HOSTAGES**

**Or: How Dave The Vehicon Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Autobots**

* * *

*_Megatron, you have three of my Autobots hostage. I want them back unharmed_.*

The leader of the Decepticons reclined in his throne, pleased with the situation playing out before him. Though the Autobots had stolen some of the protoforms aboard the Harbinger, they had placed themselves into his servos.

"So the mighty Optimus Prime has decided to beg for the lives of his soldiers," the gladiator tormented. "How pathetic. We would not enter such hostage negotiations with you. Why do you think the Decepticons would even entertain the notion of bargaining with you for the lives of three worthless Autobot soldiers who allowed themselves to be captured for sparklings?"

*_Because you're gloating about it_,* Optimus countered somberly but forcefully. *_Name your terms._*

Megatron only wished that Prime could see the look on his face as he did just that.

...

"Absolutely not!" Ratchet snarled across the Autobot communication frequency. "None of them would agree to such a trade!"

_*I'm inclined to agree with the Doctor_,* Ultra Magnus added with a commanding air of formality. *_We cannot afford to turn you over to Megatron in exchange for Arcee, Bulkhead and Jazz._*

*_I don't see how we have a choice_,* Prime responded.

*_It's too tactically advantageous for Megatron to have you as a prisoner. Not only would he have access to all of our intelligence but he'd have the Matrix as well_,* Prowl said. _*You're going to have to ask him to name some other terms. We'll deal with the fallout._*

Unhappy silence followed on the radio frequency for what seemed like forever, Prime finally relenting. *_All right. I'll see what I can do_.*

...

Megatron chuckled to himself. He could tell how much Prime wanted to do the noble thing, the honorable thing, the strategically foolish thing, and turn himself in, but he surmised that Prime's advisors had soundly brought that idea to heel. While the most debilitating option had been removed from play, he still had plenty of thumbscrews to turn.

"Perhaps you're right, Prime. Your head commands a price much higher than a mere three Autobot soldiers," Megatron mused, taking his time and enjoying the strength of his bargaining posture. He briefly considered making hostage of taking of enemy soldiers a regular affair if it could command such a reaction from the soft-hearted Autobots.

"Very well. You Autobots came onto Decepticon property and stole something from us. In exchange for your friends . . ." The grin on his face threatened to split his head in half. " . . . We want the protoforms back."

...

"No!" June gasped, drawing a hand to her mouth. Her heart sank in her chest as she looked to Shiftlock.

The new mother held the still quiescent protoforms closer to her body, sitting up on the emergency berth, staring at the communications console with a look of disbelieving horror.

Ratchet held out a hand to the others, drawing a finger to his lips, requesting their quiet as he went back to the control console. "We can send them back through the ground bridge," he said. "But they're live, so if you want to make any use of them, you'd better get them into transportation stasis within a cycle."

*_Very good_,* Megatron replied. *_But you won't mind if we make certain you return all of them. We will be taking the time to make certain that the numbers on the cargo manifest add up with what you bring us_.*

Ratchet grimmaced, shutting his eyes, the mood in the room sinking through the floor. June hugged the children a little closer. The ploy had failed.

"We - we can't do that," Ratchet finally replied.

_*Then we are at an impasse. I'm afraid we'll have to execute the Wrecker and the Special Operations soldier - your third in command, is it? We'll be keeping the two-wheeler. She can help us put the rest of the protoforms to good use,_* Megatron stated, tightening the noose.

Jack's fist tightened. "You're barbaric!" he snarled, making sure he was loud enough to be heard.

_*Is that Arcee's human pet?_* Megatron taunted, his tone aggravatingly condescending. _*If you can't bear to be parted from your mistress, you can always come join her! I'm certain we have a cage big enough for you to call home_.* He chuckled darkly. *_And where is Miss Nakadai? Would she like to hear Bulkhead being torn apart?_*

"Get scrapped!" Miko yelled defiantly, her body trembling in anger and fear for the big green Autobot that was all but a father to her.

"That's enough!" Shiftlock snapped, sliding off the berth and walking over to the comm array, holding her sparklings in either arm. "What good are my children to you, Megatron? Turning them over to you to kill is no better than the alternative you're implying. Trading three of us just to kill two helpless sparklings? What do you take us for, idiots - or are you so incapable on the battlefield that the only way you can stop us is to go after us before we can move?"

...

Megatron narrowed his eyes. "So you were the one that needed the protoforms. How interesting." He drummed his talons against the armest of his throne. "You are quite right, Shiftlock. It would be a waste for me to kill two sparklings when I could kill two Autobots and take the third to recover our numbers. I have a better idea, one I think you'll agree to: Turn over the sparklings to us, and I will personally see to their care. Under my direct tutelage they will become fine Decepticon warriors."

He decided to twist the knife. "But that would still leave us two to three, which is hardly a fair trade. I don't think children should be separated from their mother at such a tender age, do you? _You will be coming with them_."

...

All optics were on Shiftlock. Silence hit the Autobot comm channel.

*_You do not have to agree to Megatron's terms_,* Optimus Prime counselled.

Shiftlock looked back at the expressions of those around her: Worry. Fear. Hope. Frustration. Conflicted emotion. She looked down at the two tiny bundles in her arms, their optics still shut, their brain modules still compiling and spark frames still building network connections. They weren't yet aware of the battle that was being fought over their futures.

"No disrespect meant, sir - but I do," Shiftlock said, steeling herself to what was to come. "Megatron: I don't trust you any further than I can throw you, but do I have your word that if I come willingly, you will not harm my children?"

*_You have my word as a Decepticon_,* Megatron smoothly replied.

"Your word as a _deceiver_? Not good enough," Shiftlock retorted. "Swear on your honor and glory as the champion of Kaon, and I'm yours."

This seemed to give the leader of the Decepticons pause. He replied after a small delay, his tone more forthright and sincere. "I swear it."

"I will arrive at the coordinates you transmit within a few moments. I should say my goodbyes," she offered.

*_Very well. Be prompt, Autobot, or the deal is off_.* Megatron's transmission ended, coordinates showing up on the holographic screen.

"You can't do this!" Rafael protested, stepping forward. "There's gotta be another way!"

"War is a dirty business," Shiftlock said firmly but consolingly to the youngest of the three kids. "We've had a general moratorium on generating new Cybertronians in the Autobot ranks since the Great War began, and it was to prevent situations like this from happening. Nevertheless, hostage situations are as old as warfare itself, and when it comes down to who lives and who dies . . . you can't let your feelings get in the way. Three for three, even trade. Everyone comes home."

"Except for you and the sparklings," Ratchet pointed out remorsefully.

"I'm a Wrecker," Shiftlock reminded him. "Impossible odds behind enemy lines is kind of our thing." She looked around the room to the others and gave them an encouraging smile. "Megatron thinks he's getting easy prey that he can push around however he wants. All he's getting is a grenade waiting for her pin to be pulled."

...

The groundbridge opened. Shiftlock stepped through, holding her offspring. Bumblebee and Smokescreen passed through the groundbridge behind Shiftlock, each with a stasis-set Protoform in either arm.

Arcee was lying on the ground, still unconscious from Knock Out's energon prod as the Aston Martin stood over her, weapon pointed at the femme's back. Bulkhead was on his knees nearby, arms behind his head, with Blackout's chest cannon charged up and waiting to fire. Jazz was on the other side of Arcee, badly beaten; Barricade looked like he had fared no better, despite the smug look on his face. Starscream was immediately nearby, a missile pointed at Jazz to keep the special operations soldier at bay.

The valley near the stone arc and forest the framed the crash site of the Harbinger was ringed with Vehicons, Insecticons, and Seekers. There was no possible way of Autobot escape barring the direct intervention of Primus himself.

Megatron strolled across the ground with victorious confidence, his shadow falling over the Wrecker and her young. Bumblebee and Smokescreen scowled up at the tyrant, waves of loathing rolling off their electromagnetic fields.

"Let the others go first," Shiftlock demanded. "You know I won't go back on my word."

"But I cannot say the same for your associates," Megatron stated. He pointed to a contingency of Vehicons a short distance. "Have the scout and the young upstart place the protoforms over there, and move away from the groundbridge. We can begin releasing the prisoners one at a time, starting with Bulkhead."

He looked over at the Autobot prisoners, particularly savoring the expression on Jazz's face. He never dreamed he would see such delightful agony rolling across the Autobot's features.

His fusion cannon was aimed at one of the sparklings in Shiftlock's arms. "I know you Autobots are fond of last-moment heroics, so I'm going to give you some _incentive_ to do as you are told. If any of you attempts an escape, I can guarantee you it will come at a cost."_  
_

Bumblebee angrily moved away from the bridge, setting his two protoforms down at the feet of the Vehicons, whose weapons were kept aimed on him. Smokescreen followed, both of the younger Autobots keeping their eyes on Megatron, furious and frustrated at the situation.

"Very good," Megatron praised, his eyes never leaving the three Autobot soldiers in front of him. "Blackout, release the other Wrecker."

Blackout pushed Bulkhead forward with his foot, still holding the stump of his arm, now patched to prevent him from bleeding out. Bulkhead stumbled forward, getting up and sneering at Blackout threateningly before walking over to the groundbridge. His spark sank as he laid eyes on Shiftlock and the two little ones in his arms. "I'm not worth this, Shiftie," he said. "You should have just let me offline."

Shiftlock managed a smile for Bulkhead. "It'll be okay, Bulk. I promise."

"Soundwave, open a ground bridge," Megatron said aloud, speaking over the Decepticon open frequency. He kept his weapon on Shiftlock and glanced towards the other two captives.

"Scout," Megatron commanded Bumblebee, "I don't think your friends are very lively right now. You and your friend can go retrieve them."

Bumblebee beeped something profane as he sullenly marched towards Arcee and Jazz. Smokescreen followed behind. "Don't think this is over, Megatron!" he growled as he moved pass the silver titan.

Megatron just laughed. "Oh, but I think it _is_."

Smokescreen knelt by Arcee and tenderly scooped her up into his arms, sighing through his vents. He glowered at Knock Out, daggers in his eyes. The Aston Martin simply looked amused by the display. Bumblebee slid an arm around Jazz's back, moving the wounded Porche's arm around his neck, helping him to stand and gingerly walk towards the open groundbridge.

"Say goodbye to your family, Jazz," Megatron taunted. "They belong to _me_ now."

"Bring me... bring me over to 'em Bee," Jazz weakly requested, ignoring Megatron's taunts. All he wanted was to see them. He'd already missed too much, and he was about to miss even more.

Bumblebee nodded sympathetically, helping Jazz over to Shiftlock. The three Autobots huddled close, Megatron keeping an eye and a fusion cannon on the cluster.

Through the cracked visor, Jazz looked down, and for the first time - and he prayed not the last - he saw his children. Tucked up against their mother, innocent and helpless, the two protoforms, one with red power lines, the other with blue, were oblivious to the world. Jazz gently stroked the top of each of their heads. "They're beautiful, baby," he said softly to Shiftlock.

"They can't help it, they have a good looking father," Shiftlock replied through a weak chuckle, fighting back tears.

Jazz caressed the side of Shiftlock's face. "You shoulda let me go," he protested softly.

"Everything's going to be okay. Trust me," she replied, trembling through the strength of the emotions she fought to control. "Go home. Get repaired. It'll be allright. Everyone's coming out of this alive."

"I think that's enough," Megatron snapped harshly. "Take your injured and leave, Autobots. Shiftlock - come to me. We're leaving."

Dipping her head low to try to hide her face, the orange and black femme slowly crossed the dust to Megatron's side, walking with him as he turned and strode towards the ground bridge across the valley. She stole a glance back at heartbroken faces of Jazz, Bumblebee, Smokescreen and Bulkhead as she passed through the green vortex into the heart of the Decepticon base.

* * *

**I'm trying shorter chapters in order to produce them more quickly. We'll see how this works, as I'd like to be able to bust out a chapter every day or two.**

**More to come!**


	2. Chapter 2

Vehicons snapped to salute as Megatron passed them in the hallway, walking the newest member(s) of the Decepticons at his side to the medical bay for an examination and assessment. Megatron paid them no mind, effectively tuning them out. Their respect was background noise that constantly permeated his every move through the Nemesis. He only noticed any of them now if they failed to genuflect within eyesight.

Walking alongside Megatron, the top of her helm roughly reaching his hip, was Shiftlock. She was largely copper-orange in color, with black markings on her doorwings, gauntlets and shins, and a prominent glossy black stripe down her torso plate that matched the color of her helm. She had an athletic, more curvy build than most of the other Autobot femmes, particularly the two-wheelers like Arcee, Chromia and Elita-One, who were all lithe, slender two-wheelers; formerly a Cybertronian speedster frame, she had managed to scan and assimilate a McLaren MP4-12C, a match to her racer's nature. Over the course of the war the bold, idealistic femme from the Dead End of Polyhex had been forged into a determined warrior, joining the ranks of the Wreckers under Ultra Magnus' command.

Megatron allowed himself a fraction of a smile. The Decepticon insignia, branded onto her frame by the Senate Enforcers long ago, though faded over time, was still present, a poignant reminder that she had started out as one of them. He briefly wondered how much hell she had caught during the thick of the Great War, surrounded by warborn Autobots who had come online and been taught to hate anything bearing that mark.

He stopped in front of the Medical Bay. "Before you are assigned your living space, I require a full examination, both of you and your sparklings, to ensure that you are not carrying any tracking or monitoring devices. You will also turn in your weapons."

"Fine," Shiftlock replied flatly. "Who's on duty?"

"An old friend of yours," Megatron casually replied as the door slid open.

"Hello again, Shiftlock. It's been awhile since I poked around under your hood," Knock Out stated with a sly smile, gesturing towards one of the berths.

The fembot grimaced. "There's a reason for that." She looked up at Megatron. "Don't tell me he's going to be examining my children. He wouldn't know a protoform from an impact wrench."

Knock Out grunted irritably. "That's no way to talk to your Chief Medical Officer," he retorted. "I don't have to be **gentle** if I don't want to."

"Your assessment, though disrespectful, is correct," Megatron stated, giving Shiftlock a warning glance. "That is why Shockwave will be tending to the examination of the protoforms."

Shiftlock felt the icy fingers of fear claw into the back of her helm. She held her children a little more tightly to her chest as the powerful form of the monoptic scientist made his way over to her, that single, expressionless red optic seeming to bore a hole into her.

His hand extended, open, waiting for her to place one of the unawakened infants within its grasp.

She balked, staring at the mech's hand. It was like being asked to trust your newborn child to the open jaws of a crocodile. Her arms refused to move.

"Did I or did I not promise you that no harm would come to the sparklings?" Megatron asked gruffly. "Give them to Shockwave. He is only going to scan them. Nothing more."

Shiftlock's plates were raised and vents open like hackles raised on the back of a threatened animal. "Tell me which table you want them on," she countered, sidestepping the necessity of placing them directly in Shockwave's hands.

The purple mech withdrew his servo, pointing to two empty berths next to the one Knock Out was standing by. "Place one completed protoform on each. They are not far from awakening."

She glanced down at the two infants in her arms. She had no idea how Shockwave could tell; she herself could not. There seemed to be no appreciable difference in their status. She chalked it up to her own inexperience as the question of whether or not she would become experienced in the process followed immediately after. Would she be able to return to Jazz, to spark further offspring with him, or . . .

Shiftlock walked over to the diagonal metal tables, not dwelling further on that matter.

Carefully she laid each completed protoform on the center of a berth, fussing over their comfort as only a mother could, and hovered nearby as Shockwave approached the defenseless sparklings.

Knock Out folded his arms and leaning against the wall, observing the goings on with detached interest, choosing to remain quiet and watch the outcome unless otherwise beckoned. He'd learned long ago that the less said around Megatron, the better. It had certainly worked in Soundwave's favor.

Megatron stepped closer, Shockwave holding a scanning device in his good hand, tracing the blue-lined protoform with a thin green beam. "So you say they will activate soon, Shockwave?" Megatron questioned, looking at the two silvery doll-like creatures curled in fetal balls on the berths.

"Affirmative," the scientist replied, going about his work unperturbed by the raw nerves and fretful wavelengths of their nearby mother. "My Liege, do you have experience with sparklings?"

Megatron looked up at his Lieutenant. "No," he replied, his mood neutral and relaxed.

"When they awaken, they will seek confirmation of their parentage. If you wish to take advantage of the imprinting period immediately after activation, you can convince them to see you as their father," Shockwave replied, finishing the scans on the first infant, moving around the berth to the second.

"No!" Shiftlock protested. "That's going too far, you are NOT their father!"

Megatron scowled at Shiftlock, his temper flaring as he leaned down to meet the fembot face to face, attempting to use his greater size and overwhelming persona to intimidate her as he so often did with his troops. Knock Out reflexively cringed.

"I will tell them whatever I want!" he roared at Shiftlock. "I promised I would spare them and raise them as Decepticons, but I made no such guarantees on **your** life! If you want to live to see your children grow up you will play along, or I will destroy you here and now and tell them you died sparking them!"

Shiftlock did not back down against Megatron's forceful threats and invasion of her personal space, his temper bringing out a steely defiance in her features and body language. "Are you sure that's what you want?" she asked icily. "Because if they assume you are their father and know I am their mother, _we're going to have to pretend to be mates_."

Megatron narrowed his optics, momentarily considering the ramifications of such an action. The fact that she refused to cringe before him was getting under his mesh, inflaming a need to crush her and force her to submit to his demands. Fortunately his self-control overrode the bloodlust rushing through his fuel lines. "_You should be so lucky to have me as a mate_," he hissed. "Very well, Shiftlock. We will put on this masquerade, with _**all** of its trappings._" He let that sink in for a moment before he continued. "Keep in mind that you and these sparklings will be treated like _any other Decepticons_, so I will brook no insubordination nor tolerate repeated failure. You and your children will serve the Decepticon cause _as you should have from the beginning_, or **all** of your lives will be forfeit!"

Shiftlock continued to glare into the Decepticon Lord's vermilion optics, but her plates lowered, a silent assent to Megatron's terms that allowed her to save face from the indignity of agreeing to it verbally. This was good enough in Megatron's estimation, and he stood up straight once more.

Megatron's hand clapped down on her right shoulder. "Now look happy, _dearest. _**Our** sparklings will be waking up soon," he murmured threateningly.

She felt like she was going to purge her tanks, but forced herself to smile.

Knock Out couldn't believe what he was seeing and/or hearing. It was going to make _fantastic_ gossip among the troops.

Shockwave completed his scan of the red-lined protoform. "Both are functioning normally," he announced. It was about this time that the red-lined protoform began to stir, servos flexing and limbs tensing as the spark inside established the final neural-network connections to the body. The internal transformation mechanism triggered, and with a flash of white light from the transparent housing on its torso, the sparkling's body began to expand and change.

The compacted mass of CNA stretched out, taking shape, reaching the approximate size of an average scout (roughly half Megatron's height); its body was slender and curvy, the charcoal gray of its mesh adorned with glossy black plating marked with candy apple red accents, most notably in the form of stylized flames trailing up arms and legs. It - _she -_ was a speedster-frame like her parents, and she looked like Jazz reincarnated as a woman. Shiftlock's forced smile became genuine; she almost wanted to laugh. Oh, the ruse was going to be hard to keep with a daughter that looked like _that_. Megatron was not nearly so amused. He _really_ had to force a smile now, which made his expression more comical than anything else.

The second sparkling began to stir; its body expanded into something taller, somewhere around the height of Megatron's chest. He, too, was a speedster-type, but curiously, wings sprouted from the backs of his shoulder plates. A car with wings? He appeared to be. His armoring was a perfect white over paler gray mesh, blue powerlines and paint accents, his body type strong and athletic, a fit for a warrior. His torso had the same sort of extended roundness as Jazz, though his coloration would have suited Prowl.

Both of them sat up, looking around, blue optics searching for parents, coming to a stop on Shiftlock first; she was the only femme present.

"Welcome to the world," Shiftlock said gently, smiling at the both of them. They smiled back in turn, recognizing her wave field and voice almost instinctively; she felt like home.

"Where is father?" the femme asked, not recognizing the wave field of any of the other mechs as familiar and welcoming.

"I'm right here," Megatron answered immediately, pouring on charismatic charm that hadn't been seen since the days before the Great War.

Shiftlock's engines hitched and her plates fluttered like the ruffled feathers of a startled bird, but she kept up the pretense. "Yes," she agreed a little reservedly. "He's right here."

The two siblings looked between each other, as if puzzling this feeling of inconsistency among themselves; having nothing else to go on and being as trusting as, well, _newborns_, they accepted the statement as fact. Carefully trying out their limbs, they slid off the berths, standing shakily at first, marveling at the sensation of being upright. Of the cool hardness of the metal. Of the noises their feet made when they touched the ground. Everything was new, fascinating, and intense.

Megatron walked over to them both, opening his arms. "Come to your father, children," he beckoned. The two of them took unsteady first steps towards Megatron, reaching out to him, touching his arms and chest with the sort of reverent awe one you might expect if Megatron had been Primus himself. The Decepticon Commander had to admit to himself that he enjoyed the look of abject worship in their eyes. If only everyone could be so tractable and moldable to his will.

Shiftlock tried to hide her loathing. It should be Jazz standing there, not this tyrant pretender. She resolved to do everything in her power to make Megatron pay, somehow, for usurping her mate's place in their children's lives.

"There is much for you to learn," Megatron said to the two new Cybertronians. "I will teach you. Come with me, both of you. Your mother will be along shortly; she needs maintenance done first." He cast a commanding look to Shiftlock, warning her not to interfere.

Innocently the siblings took Megatron's hands, and let him lead them out to of the medical bay, their limbs gaining strength and coordination with every step.

The door slid shut, leaving Shiftlock alone with Knock Out and Shockwave.

* * *

**As you may have noticed, I'm kind of skipping fannon convention concerning how sparklings grow, having them essentially being adult babies. This is kind of a throwback to the original series, where new Transformers were built or came online already fully formed, but maybe a bit naive.**

**This does not, however, preclude our two new Cybertronians from being just as much of a handful. :)**


	3. Chapter 3

**The story, she is just FLOWING!**

**Note: I gave this a proofread and slight rewrite; I didn't feel it was up to my usual standards.**

* * *

Staring at the door through which Megatron had left, Shiftlock growled in exasperation and anger. She no longer needed to keep up pretenses, not when that tyrant was out of earshot, and she didn't care if Knock Out and Shockwave heard her.

The red Aston Martin found the entire situation _hilarious_. Oh, certainly, having a former Decepticon-turned-Autobot walking around the base as a sort of prisoner-with-privileges was going to be awkward for the entire crew; nevertheless he intended to relish every uncomfortable moment it produced. Like telling Barricade Shiftlock was on the Nemesis, and with Megatron as her 'mate', the Saleen couldn't lay a digit on her. He wanted to set up a betting pool among the other officers as to whether or not Barricade would blow an internal fuel line once he knew. Schadenfreude? Most _definitely_.

"Temper temper," he teased, verbally poking at the femme in a condescending tone. He was almost certain she'd hiss and spit like an angry feline, and Knock Out felt like feeding his perverse desire to rile Shiftlock into a frothing rage.

Sadly no such reaction was coming. "Oh shut up," Shiftlock grumbled, folding her arms, her temper once more held in check.

At the diagnostics computer in the far end of the medical bay, Shockwave busied himself with a deeper examination of the protoforms' pre-awakening scans. The tete-a-tete between mech and femme behind him only reinforced his commitment to emotionless logic.

Alas, there was still work to be done. Knock Out could only play for so long before risking unpleasant consequences. "Get up on the berth," he requested, slipping into a more professional demeanor.

Shiftlock acquiesced, accepting a little more of her fate as she hopped up onto the diagonal metal table, lying down. "No funny business," she warned, mistrustful of her newly assigned medic.

_*Le gasp!*_ Knock Out feigned offense, one hand on his chest, batting his optics. "Funny business? Moi? But I'm dealing with Megatron's _blushing bride_." Okay, there was time for just a _little_ more play.

Shiftlock looked daggers at him.

Knock Out laughed. Bingo! We struck angry. "Oh it could be much worse, Shiftie! You have no idea what an advantage you have right now," he said cheerfully, lowering a scanner from the multi-tool that hung over each medical berth.

"Advantage? Being weaponless and captive on the Nemesis and forced to put up with this disgusting hoax?" Shiftlock retorted while fantasizing about twisting Knock Out's limbs into pretzel behind his back.

"That disgusting hoax, as you put it, is going to keep Barricade off your tailpipe," Knock Out smoothly replied, elated by the look on the fembot's face as she realized how right he was.

She put a hand over her optics. "Oh Primus he's on this ship. I completely forgot he's on this ship."

"Yeeeup," Knock Out casually replied, running a scanning beam over Shiftlock and turning to look at the monitors. He was satisfied with large portion of goat he'd just gotten from the femme, and decided to throw her one of its bones in return. "You might want to lose the attitude and start making friends. You're going to be here awhile, so fitting in will be to your advantage in the long run."

Shiftlock sighed and stared up at the multitool, contemplating the best possible course of action. Of course she intended to escape, but it might take awhile; trying to make certain that both she and her children made it out in one piece would take longer. Blending in really would be the wisest choice. "Some of you used to **be** friends," Shiftlock countered, though agreeing with the notion.

"If there's one thing I've learned lately, it's that you have to be willing to put aside old grudges if you want to survive," Knock Out commented, thinking of Airachnid.

Well that was a change of pace. Shiftlock remembered Knock Out having a vengeful streak a mile wide when it came to even petty offenses. Something must have changed over the vorns. "When did you start dispensing sage advice?" she asked, genuinely curious.

"It's a talent you acquire when you're patching up people for doing stupid things," Knock Out answered somewhat sourly. It was partially true, and a satisfying enough answer to deflect anyone away from the real reasons that hovered over his head (one deck above him) and was opposite him on the other side of the room.

Shiftlock laughed softly in spite of herself: Knock Out was on his way to becoming a grumpy old Ratchet. Maybe an evil, red, _sociopathic_ Ratchet, but a Ratchet nonetheless.

"Looks like you're clear," Knock Out said, finishing the scan. "I'm pretty sure you have weapons hidden all over your frame, so just unload them onto the berth next to you."

That killed what little good mood Shiftlock had, and reminded her that she would be defenseless, a sheep among wolves. Standing back up, she began to remove an energon knife, grappling line, and hand blaster, setting them down on the steel of the table.

Knock Out blinked. "That's it?"

"Who needs more?" Shiftlock asked, smirking.

"Wreckers are known for their ingenuity," Shockwave commented from his console.

"Yeah... I suppose you'd be familiar with that, wouldn't you Shockwave?" Shiftlock asked with a smirk. After the launch of the Ark, the Wreckers, under Ultra Magnus' command, had been tasked with defending what was left of Iacon, protecting Alpha Trion, and sending search and rescue squads looking for other Autobots who had fallen into Shockwave's hands, leaving only after they had finished freeing the last survivors they could find. They were tough days, and the attacks by Shockwave's Insecticon swarms were constant, but it was a time that she could look back on with pride. She had no only survived, she had _thrived_ - and being able to verbally slap Shockwave without repercussions was gratifying. What she would have given to have had Grimlock here right now.

And yet, her bravado inched backwards as Shockwave looked up from his work to turn around and face her, stalking closer, overshadowing her with his approach. Had she made a dangerous miscalculation in what she thought she could get away with? Was his stoic mien just a facade, and had she foolishly triggered the release of vorns of suppressed emotion?

"Indeed," he answered, unflustered, as he turned and walked past Shiftlock, leaving the room.

"He always gives me the creeps," Knock Out commented lowly, exposing a shared discomfiture at the monoptic scientist's presence.

Shiftlock raised an optic ridge, the nervous chill of her almost confrontation with Shockwave finally starting to melt away. "... Why are you being nice to me? I'm an Autobot. Moreover, I'm a traitor to the cause."

"Not anymore," Knock Out replied with easygoing confidence in the veracity of his words.

Bricks of realization dropped by the ton onto Shiftlock's spark, threatening to crush it in her chest. He was right. Until she could escape, he was right.

_If_ she could ever find a way to escape.

"I'm sure you're going to want to get back to your-" Knock Out tried to stiffle a laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. "- "_mate"_ and children. Don't want to keep "Daddy" waiting. He's not a pleasant mech to be around when it comes to delays."

Shiftlock could just _hear_ the air quotes around those words. She didn't want to think about it. Reality was closing the walls in around her.

"There's a Vehicon outside that will escort you to Lord Megatron. You're going to want to call him that, or 'my Liege', unless he tells you otherwise. Don't even believe for a moment that he would spare you from the usual disciplinary measures if you don't mind your manners. Just ask Starscream," Knock Out advised.

For just a nanoklik, familiarity crept in around the edges of Shiftlock's perception; it was as if she were back in the pits, Knock Out as her medic, advising her on racing techniques or which mechs to watch out for in the next derby. They were good memories, but she tried to stuff them down and cast them out of her processes. She didn't want to feel good about anything involving this mess.

The door opened, the violet-visored face of a ground-type Vehicon looking in. "Shiftlock?" he asked. "Come with me. Lord Megatron's orders."

...

"So are you going to be my escort from now on?" Shiftlock asked the Vehicon at her side as they walked through the open hallways of the Nemesis, the sound of their metal pedes echoing on ahead of them.

"I suppose so," he answered noncommittally, seeming uncomfortable with conversation. Why would anyone - particularly an Autobot - want to chatter with him as if he were an old friend? Wasn't he nothing but an energon-filled barrier to smash through on the way to the higher ranking officers to them?

Apparently not in this one's estimation. She kept talking. "Well, we'd better start getting used to each other then. You got a name?"

The taller black and gray mech's waves were retracting closer to his frame in shyness. A name? Standing out was bad. You could hide in a crowd of duplicates. "No," he said distractedly, turning a corner as they went along.

Shiftlock frowned. This struck her as wrong - _entirely_ wrong. "Nothing?" she asked.

"You don't need a name when you're a genericon," the Vehicon said brusquely, trying to shut down the chit-chat before it went any farther.

Now Shiftlock was angry, for multiple reasons, the least of which was the utter irony walking alongside her in the form of a nameless, low-caste drone among a revolutionary army that had once sought to abolish the position of nameless, low-caste drone. The old Decepticon ideology reared its head inside of her. Her time-worn brand seemed to itch itself to life across her mesh.

"Yes you do," Shiftlock countered, not letting the matter drop.

The Vehicon grew restless and ill at east. "Names are for those that have earned them," he countered. There. That should be good enough. Maybe she'd shut up. They were getting closer to their destination anyways, and then he could drop her off to whatever fate Megatron had planned for her, and forget this whole ridiculous notion of individuality.

"That's the biggest pile of pit-scrap I've ever heard," Shiftlock challenged.

She just _did not give up_! Now the Vehicon's discomfort was turning to anger. "And what would you know about it?!" he said, whirling on her, stopping in the middle of the hallway, plates raised, EMF sizzling against hers as with the same level of aggression as a shove backwards.

Shiftlock stubbornly persisted like a mule that refused to budge. She could be as obstinate as Ironhide at times. "I wasn't given a name either. I had to give myself one, because I was a low-caste, defective Empty," she explained firmly.

The Vehicon suddenly stood back up, field emitting a flourish of high-end spectrum surprise, letting up on the smaller femme's. "You... you were nameless?"

Shiftlock smiled back up at the genericon. "I was. Let me show you something," she said, pushing part of a shoulder plate out of the way. There, branded into her mesh, was a scar in the shape of a Decepticon insignia.

The Vehicon's visor flickered, the equivalent of a blink. " . . . You're one of us?" he questioned.

"I am more one of you than you know. I was part of the original revolution. I once stood alongside Megatron," Shiftlock said.

"So then . . . why did you leave?"

She looked the Vehicon square in the optics. "Because the Decepticon cause lost its way. We were all like you. We rose up because we desired something more than being disposable soldiers and labor."

The Vehicon suddenly placed his hand against Shiftlock's mouth. He drew a finger to his faceplate, beseeching the fembot with his electromagnetic field: _Be quiet. Danger. Listeners._

She understood and sent back a frequency of gratitude for the Vehicon's warning. She'd almost forgotten about Soundwave's capacity to be eyes and ears everywhere on the ship.

"So in the tradition of the old ways, I think you should have a name," she continued, winking with one optic. Had to keep the conversation going, lest they tip off the spymaster.

The Vehicon continued walking, gesturing for Shiftlock to follow. "I will think of one," he assured her. In truth, the idea appealed to him - and now he wanted to know more about the "old ways" of the Decepticon cause.

They came up to the door to the command room, and the Vehicon turned to the orange and black femme to see her off. "I'll be waiting here when Lord Megatron is finished with you," he said, a silent wave of eager anticipation sent in her direction. If she had wanted to make a friend aboard the Nemesis, it seemed she'd had success.

Shiftlock didn't like the way that sounded, however: 'Finished with you'. Finished doing _what? _she thought. He made it sound as if she were a meal to be devoured. Megatron's comments about playing mates with "all the trappings" came to mind - so maybe in a way, she _was_. Swallowing audibly, she faced the doors, and braced herself for whatever would come.


	4. Chapter 4

**And now, onto the show!**

**Hurray for not having writer's block on this one. :)**

* * *

_(A short time before ..._ )

Starscream leaned against one of the communication arrays, chuckling darkly.

"So you say Barricade has absolutely no idea that Megatron is not only playing 'daddy' to the Wrecker's offspring, he's pretending to be her_ sparkmate_? Oh he's not just going to blow a fuel line. I wouldn't be surprised if his _spark_ explodes. Put me down for fifty energon chips on 'spontaneous internal injury'."

*_Will do_,* Knock Out said on the Nemesis' internal comm system. *_And I've got Soundwave down for twenty - Playing it safe as usual._*

*_Here's a thought_,* Airachnid said, piping up on the comm. *_What do you think Lord Megatron will do when the sparklings ask why mommy and daddy don't spend much time around each other_?*

Starscream burst into laughter, his wings sweeping upwards as he leaned against the terminal, one hand over his optics. "Do - do you think he'll stoop to sharing a berth with her? Bahahahahah!" He waggled the fingers of his other hand, gesticulating as he tried to bring himself back down to a chortle. "Kisses on the cheek and pet names and loving glances across the room?"

Even Soundwave was not unaffected by the mental images_ that_ produced. His EMF was fluctuating wildly with mirth even if he was as silent as ever.

Knock Out sounded like he was desperately trying to keep his cool. He cleared his vents to regain his composure. *_That's terrible to consider!_* He choked back a giggle as he tried to chastise them all for thinking such funny, funny thoughts about their leader. It wasn't working._ *I don't think it will get that far, but this is probably the best idea Lord Megatron's ever had - if only for the fact that we aren't going to be bored for a good long while seeing how it all plays out._*

Soundwave gently tapped on Starscream's shoulder with a long, chopstick finger and signaled through his field that Megatron would soon arrive: _Look busy_.

The Air Commander cleared his vents as well, straightening up and going over status reports as if he hadn't been laughing his ailerons off a few moments before.

The doors opened to the command center. Megatron entered, with a black and red femme grounder, and a white and blue winged mech grounder... seeker?

The wings on the white one caught Starscream's attention immediately. It was likely the youngling would be a flier, which would put him under Starscream's command eventually. The thought cheered him - he had once been a flight instructor to new Seekers in Vos. It had been a very long time since he had been around a new jet, even if this jet also had four wheels.

Come to think of it, it had been a very long time since _any_ of them had been around newborn Cybertronians. Starscream pondered the effect this would have on morale and of the general behavior of the crew.

"Greetings, Lord Megatron," Starscream began with a bow and a hand over his chest, genuflecting respectfully. "I see that the generation was successful! The sparklings look healthy and strong. Of course we expected no less from such a _glorious_ father."

Megatron raised an optic ridge at Starscream, the faintest hint of a smile at his Lieutenant playing along, despite the obsequious behavior. "Yes," he mused, looking over his shoulder at the two sparklings that followed him like ducklings. "They will make fine Decepticons."

From there Megatron took the time to show the sparklings around the command room, explaining various ship functions to them, where they were, a little of the origins of their species, and of course the basics of the struggle between Autobot and Decepticon. The two siblings soaked up everything the leader of the Decepticons had to say like dry sponges in a bucket of water, quiet and well-behaved, implicitly trusting his information and hanging on his every word. He introduced them to Soundwave who in turn showed them Laserbeak; they fawned over the deployer with infinite curiosity, their faces lighting up with bright smiles.

Starscream was next, and he continued to extol to them the virtues of the Decepticon cause and sang the praises of their "father" and his glory as a gladiator of Kaon. He was earning _massive _brownie points in Megatron's eyes, and for doing little more than telling the sparklings the equivalent of bedtime stories. They listened to it all with such trusting faces.

Trusting, adorable, innocent faces.

... _darnit stop having trusting adorable faces!_

At first Starscream thought this would be like dealing with some of the drone Vehicons, two slightly more colorful faces in a sea of jaded, war-hardened soldiers that had been around him since forever ago - but it was not. They were looking at him in a manner so naively charming that he was beginning to _feel things_. Things he wasn't certain he was capable of feeling after so long. These two seemed to _like_ him, and not because they had to, not because it was part of climbing the chain of command and prestige, but because they saw him as nothing but perfect and good, and had no fear of placing themselves within reach of his talons.

It was utterly disarming, because he was beginning to believe he could like them back, and that they would never need to fear him.

Megatron had settled himself into the captain's chair, his modified throne and command deck, observing the interaction of the sparklings with his most trusted ally, and Starscream. He was watching the edges of Starscream's hardened persona thawing in the presence of the children. It was a development he would have to keep an eye on.

_"Lord Megatron, Shiftlock has arrived, as per your request. She is disarmed and free of any listening or tracking devices,"_ the voice of a Vehicon said through the intercom outside the door.

He smirked. This would be where the wheels of the grounder met the road._ "Send her in,"_ he answered.

The doors opened and Shiftlock walked into the control room. She didn't have much time to take in the sights because her two children rushed over to greet her, catching her up in a group hug. She laughed softly and gave in, putting an arm around each affectionately, lovingly stroking their helms.

"There you are," she said gently, her vocoder scintiliating with a unique motherly warmth. "Have you both been behaving?" she asked.

The siblings nodded the affirmative, basking in their mothers EMF, reassured by it, their sparks drawing strength and stability from her proximity, the situation not unlike a human mother nourishing her newborns on milk.

Starscream's optic twitched. That _voice_. The frequency and particular tone with which Shiftlock was speaking had a luxurious quality to it that wrapped around his processor like a perfumed veil of silk, increasing her attractiveness by ten fold. It was a natural reaction born of close proximity to the spark bonds reconnecting nearby, and the motherly purr of her voice was making the autonomic subroutines of his processor scream FERTILE FEMALE, RIDE THAT PONY in the back of his mind.

It wasn't just Starscream that found himself ... _moved_ by the display. Soundwave was absentmindedly stroking the wings of his deployer, encouraged to show Laserbeak a little extra affection through their similar bond. Megatron was sitting a little further forward in his chair.

A distraction was in order, or so Starscream wholesparkedly believed. "So, do the children have names yet?" he asked, trying to focus on the children and not their why-is-a-grounder-suddenly-attractive-to-me mother.

"They will be given names when they have earned them," Megatron dismissively announced, subtly amused at his Lieutenant's internal squirming.

Shiftlock's blue optics shot towards Megatron and locked on him like a laser guidance system.

"But sweetspark," she protested saccarine sweet, "we both gave _ourselves_ names, don't you remember? I thought we agreed to let the children choose their own names when they were ready. After all, assigned names are so much like the tyranny of the guilds that we fought so hard to stop."

The gauntlet had been thrown down with the force of a nuclear blast.

Starscream's engine hitched audibly with a choking sound and his wings stood up like the ears of a frightened rabbit. Soundwave's hand at Laserbeak's wing suddenly froze in place.

Oh so _that_ was how it was going to be. **That** was how she was going to do battle with him from the confines of the bargain they had made. Megatron's eyes narrowed and smirk crossed his face. _Challenge accepted._

"Oh that's right, dearest. How _clumsy_ of me," Megatron charmingly answered. What did names matter so long as the sparklings could be trained to kill Autobots successfully in battle? Nevertheless, he resolved to immediately remind Shiftlock of her place. He would tolerate no challenges of _any kind_ to his will.

"We really should get rid of those _Autobot_ symbols on you soon, _beloved_. They set a confusing example for our precious sparklings."

The two siblings suddenly pulled back from their mother as if they'd gotten a mouthful of castor oil, dismayed. "Mother, are you - are you one of the evil Autobots?" her daughter asked, sounding betrayed.

Shiftlock died a little inside. Megatron had maneuvered her into denying the Autobots in front of her own children, and if she lingered in her response they would doubt her in the back of their minds.

"N-no babies, I'm not," she stammered, putting forth a Herculean effort to be reassuring and sincere.

With a wide smile Megatron tightened the noose. "Don't worry, children. Your mother had been kidnapped by the evil Autobots who tried very hard to make her one of them. But now she's been rescued and come back to us once more, safe and sound."

That satisfied the twins, who pressed close to their mother once more, relieved of their fears.

*_That was the most magnificently twisted thing I have ever witnessed_,* Starscream said over the Decepticon frequencies to Megatron.

*_I have my moments_,* Megatron commed back.

"We'll have to go see _Uncle Knock Out_ about having those terrible Autobot symbols removed and replaced with something more appropriate," Megatron announced, savoring his victory. "And while your mother is getting her Decepticon insignias back, we can get them for the both of you as well."

This pleased the twins, who cheered, thanking their father profusely for the honor. Shiftlock consoled herself with a reminder that no matter what symbol was painted on her, her spark still belonged to the Autobot way, and the Autobot she loved.

*_Uncle Knock Out?_* Starscream questioned, uncertain if he'd heard that right.

*_We're going to need a babysitter, and he is the most qualified of the Decepticons aboard this ship. I shudder to think of what would become of our future warriors under the tender ministrations of Dead End or Barricade_,* Megatron replied.

Starscream made a face. *_Ugh. Right._*

*_Unless, of course, you feel that you might be better suited for the job? I noticed you paying particular attention to the boy_,* Megatron commed.

Starscream's wings flicked. *_Well, hahah, it was just interest in the fact that a pair of grounders managed to produce something with wings-_*

_*It's settled then. You'll be responsible for teaching the boy to fly_,* Megatron announced. *_Knock Out can train the female as they share a frame type._*

The Air Commander's wings drooped. *_As you say, Master_,* he morosely agreed.


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: I used Transformers Animated's female Drag Strip as the basis for Drag Strip in this Prime-verse setting. **

**She was just too cool _not_ to use. :D**

* * *

"Shockwave," Megatron said as he entered the scientist's laboratory aboard the Nemesis, "I am in need of information."

Shockwave looked up from the computer console he had been laboring over, the light from the holographic monitors and solid holographic keyboard casting a pink tint over his armor. "How may I be of service to you, my Liege?"

The laboratory was kept dimly lit and the color of its metallic walls and floors made Shockwave blend into the scenery. One might wonder if the scientist preferred it that way, allowing him an element of surprise should the sanctity of his workspace be violated. Heavy duty computers, multiple monitoring screens, hyperevolution chambers, dissection areas, medical research berths and nanolathe milling equipment for new, specialized components and armoring cluttered the walls and floors. One had to walk carefully so as not to trip over the heavy power conduits snaking along the floor panels.

Megatron momentarily wondered if the dark surroundings were a subconscious rebellion against the brightly-lit white walled facilities of the Institute that had taken Shockwave's head, emotions and former life.

"The Wrecker," he began, "How necessary is it for us to suffer her continued existence? Will executing her adversely affect the sparklings?"

"It is inadvisable to terminate the female until the sparks of her offspring are sufficiently developed and stable," Shockwave replied. "Without her spark to help sustain the sparks of her children, they would wither and perish. Normally the sparks of both parents help mature the sparks of their offspring, but a single parent can function in this task, though the young will take longer to mature."

"If you were to terminate the mother, you would have to acquire the father to keep the children alive. I doubt the Autobot Jazz would be as tractable as Shiftlock."

"I see," Megatron said, sounding disappointed. He would have to put up with the Wrecker longer, at least until the two sparklings were mature enough. He was comforted by the thought that he may be able to harden them into remorseless killers capable of offlining Shiftlock themselves.

Another thought came to mind. "Could I not support their sparks on my own?"

"No," was Shockwave's answer. "You share neither spark type nor frequency with either of them. It would not be possible for you sustain them."

Megatron grunted, acknowledging Shockwave's answer but not liking the facts laid out before him.

"My Lord, if I may?" Shockwave asked, seeking permission to speak.

"What is it, Shockwave?" the silver Decepticon lord asked.

"I would advise caution concerning who the Wrecker is exposed to at this time, particularly the other females aboard the Nemesis. Due to the strictures put upon generation during the great war, their systems are long overdue to produce sparklings, and the mother's EMF may trigger an irrepressible drive to generate. The carriers among us may also be affected," Shockwave said.

"The carriers? How?" Megatron questioned, not understanding.

"Carriers produce empty protoforms," Shockwave explained. "Sparked females or those who have recently completed their generation can trigger protoform creation subroutines in carriers."

Megatron facepalmed. He'd marched Shiftlock past all three of them just coming aboard the Nemesis.

...

"I WANT A SPARKLING!" Drag Strip snarled, throwing a chair across the mess hall and nearing hitting a couple of Vehicons in the process, who ducked and scrambled out of the way.

Wildrider and ducked under a long table. "Get ahold of yourself sis!" he begged, peeking up over the edge of the table. Motormaster seemed unphased, drinking his energon rations as if this were just normal, everyday behavior.

"DID YOU NOT SEE THEM!?" Drag Strip shouted, kicking over a table. "THEY ARE PRECIOUS AND CUTE AND _I WANT ONE_!"

"Must be that time of the vorn," Dead End quipped from his place near Motormaster.

Dead End would later regain consciousness at the far end of the mess hall, wondering how his head had managed to pass clean through the wall.

"Be reasonable!" Wildrider said, trying to persuade his sibling to calm down. "If you're sparked you won't be able to fight. Or race! You love racing - well, you love winning anyways - but you'd be slowed down while you're generating!"

"I DON'T CARE!" Drag Strip howled, frustrated beyond reason. She grabbed a nearby Vehicon who flailed in surprise, hoisted him over her head and threw him into a crowd of other Vehicons that were just trying to enjoy their meager rations in peace.

"WHAT IN THE PIT IS GOING ON IN HERE?!"

Knock Out's voice carried well through the mess hall; standing in the doorway he was already seeing medical work piling up onto his schedule in the form of lots of minor injuries and potentially (catching a look at Dead End hanging partway out of a wall) a few major ones.

Motormaster thumbed towards Drag Strip with one hand, continuing to read a magazine on the data pad in front of him.

"Oh thank Primus you're here," Wildrider exclaimed in relief. "Drag Strip's been super edgy lately and she keeps complaining about how she wants-"

"Well _hello** handsome**_," the femme Stunticon purred coyly, giving the Aston Martin bedroom glances and a flirty smile.

"D-" Knock Out blinked, looking rapidly between Wildrider and his sister who was now stalking ever closer to him with an unsettling lust in her eyes. "Did I come at a bad time?"

"Oh, not at _all_," Drag Strip grinned toothily, slithering up to the red mech and pressing herself up against him. Knock Out stared down at the suddenly salacious fembot and found himself backed up against a wall. He twitched nervously as she giggled under the hum of her engines, tracing circles with one digit across his torso plate.

"How about we go back to your quarters and take you from a Knock Out to a Knock _Up_," Drag Strip cooed.

"_W-what?!_" Knock Out verbally flailed, optics huge.

Wildrider groaned and covered his face with his hands.

"She wants babies," Motormaster succinctly stated, not bothering to turn around and watch the spectacle going on behind his back.

"I can see that!" Knock Out exclaimed, trying to move Drag Strip's roving hands away from private plating, emitting startled yelps as she somehow managed to find sensitive spots he didn't even know he _had_. She continued to giggle and toy with him, not giving a thought to the hundreds of optics locked on the two of them. The more he tried to move her away the more insistent she got; he felt as if she had suddenly become fluid, slipping through his grasp and clinging to him. "Drag Strip, I'm flattered that you - *hee hee!* - think I'm worthy to - *snicker* - father your sparklings but I don't - *bwahahaha!* - think I'm ready for that kind of responsibility -_ Oh good Primus woman, that tickles_!"

*_KNOCK OUT!_* Megatron's voice shouted over the ship's intercom. *_Drop whatever you're doing and get to the medical bay. Laserbeak is unable to dock with Soundwave_!*

Saved by the job! "Well you heard Lord Megatron sounds like that's a really big problem that needs my care so I'd better get moving talk to you later Drag Strip!" Knock Out blurted out all at once. The sound of metal grating on metal punctuated the air, everyone else wincing in sympathy, as the Aston Martin slid himself around to the doorway from against the wall, not even caring for a moment that the paint was being grated off his back. With a terrified push that put Drag Strip onto her behind, he took off running down the hallway as fast as he could go.

Drag Strip's face drew into an angry, vengeful scowl. "_Fine_," she hissed. "If you won't give me what I want, I'll find someone else that _will_."

...

Megatron noticed all the paint missing on Knock Out's back as the mech trotted into the medical bay, his engines still revving high, vents puffing heat from exertion. "What happened to you?" he questioned.

"I almost became a father in front of the entire mess hall," Knock Out groused.

"How did-?" Megatron shook his head. "Nevermind. I don't want to know. Just tend to Soundwave."

Knock Out didn't want to answer, so it worked out well for the both of them. He walked over to Soundwave. "All right what seems to be the matter?" he asked the silent mech.

Soundwave, holding Laserbeak in his hands, released the deployer. It shot up a few feet into the air, turning over and diving back down towards Soundwave to attach to the spymaster's chest.

It nested there for all of a half second before falling off and flopping onto its back on the floor.

"I see," Knock Out said, picking up Laserbeak and turning it rightside up, setting it onto a nearby berth. The Decepticon medic went to the crash cart nearby and picked up a small scanning tool and observation light, running it over Soundwave's chest at the docking point.

"Hmm. Well, the problem is that there's an obstruction in the docking bay," Knock Out ascertained. Fortunately this time it wasn't one of Wheeljack's grenades. "The bay has sealed itself and isn't allowing any deployer to dock."

Megatron had a sinking notion he knew what it was. "Let me guess. It's a protoform."

Knock Out blinked. "How did you know?"

...

Starscream meandered the hall, arms behind his back, hunched forward and contemplative. "Assigning me to train the Wrecker's offspring just because it has wings?" he complained himself. "Still, I suppose it could be worse. I could have been saddled with the grounder. Or asked to personally guard the Wrecker herself." He made a face. "_That_ would become awkward _very quickly_."

What Starscream did not know, at least not right away, that he was being listened to. Listened to and stalked.

He smiled and stopped, tapping his chin with a long, sharp finger and allowing himself to absentmindedly reminisce. "Flying lessons. How long has it been since I had anyone to give flying lessons to?" He straightened up, radiating pride. "The boy can't _help_ but become an aerial ace under _my_ tutelage-"

His wings flicked as he heard foosteps come up from behind. Startling and cringing, he whirled around. "Who's there?!" he cried, looking around frantically for the sound of the noise.

Starscream's brows drew together and he relaxed. "Oh, it's _you_," he rebuffed. "You should really learn not to sneak up on a bot when he's busy-" He searched for a word for something _other_ than daydreaming out loud. "-_planning_ on how best to serve Lord Megatron."

His expression shifted to one of concern and he took a step back, getting nervous. "Wait. Why are you looking at me like that? What are you -?!"

...

"Call it an inspired guess," Megatron answered wearily.

A shrill scream pierced the air in the hallway outside the medical bay. "No! NO! STAY BACK! NOHOHOHOH!"

Drag Strip passed by the open doorway, chipper and upbeat, holding one of Starscream's feet in each hand, dragging him along behind her. His claws futility sought purchase against the floor, screeeeeeetching along as they dug furrows into the ground.

"MASTER!" Starscream begged piteously, panicked, as he disappeared around the corner. "SAVE ME! I'M TOO IMPORTANT TO BE A FATHER!"

Megatron's expression flattened, exhausted by the chaos erupting around him. "Phase Seven was not supposed to happen like _this_."


	6. Chapter 6

"**_WHAT?!_**"

Barricade's right optic lens popped entirely out of its socket in apoplectic rage. Silently energon chips changed hands throughout the Nemesis.

"I said the reason Frenzy and Rumble can't dock with you is because you're generating a protoform. Blackout and Soundwave are having the same problems. Being near Shiftlock after she generated new sparks has set off your carrier protocols," Knock Out said, now looking for the optic lens on the floor. "And again, you have been ordered to stay away from Shiftlock, as she is now Lord Megatron's "mate"."

"Y-you mean to tell me," Barricade said, vocoder trembling in fury, "That after _all this time_, n-ot only do I **not** get to pay h-her back for rejecting me, b-but she's got me s-swollen with protoforms by **WALKING PAST ME**?!"

The other optic lens popped out.

Knock Out caught it in his open hand.

"Have you considered some kind of anger management download?" the medic asked, considering applying a forced stasis lock to Barricade to calm him down. "Your hydraulic pressure is off the charts right now. You've literally gone into a _blind_ _rage_ just now."

"It is not so bad, Barricade," Blackout said, the titan-class mech stroking his torso plates, his EMF radiating a happy glow. "We are making new life possible!"

Barricade just frothed incomprehensible profanities and flopped back onto his berth.

Knock Out recovered the other lens and stood back up, Soundwave, Barricade and Blackout occupying the row of diagnostic and support berths in front of him. "You're all on medical leave until your carrier bays finish the protoforms. You are to stay on those berths, drink your energon and get plenty of rest. You'll be back on your pedes before long, so just be patient." He carried Barricade's eyes with him to gather tools for a repair. "... I'm going to have to set up some kind of quarantine for Shiftlock on the ship. This is getting out of hand; with Soundwave down someone else is going to have to take over the communications duties." He wheeled the crash cart towards Barricade, the mech's lenses in a sterile dish as he considered who could possibly take over that chore. He could only think of one.

"I wonder where Starscream ended up."

...

"AAAAAHHHHH!"

The Air Commander blasted down the hallway screaming, having transformed into jet mode, leaving Drag Strip in the dust in his escape.

Frustrated and even saddened, Drag Strip moped against the wall, rejected a second time. Wasn't she sexy enough for any of these mechs? Didn't she drive them crazy with desire? Did this mean she was ... _ugly?_

It was almost more than the fembot Stunticon could take. Overly competitive by nature and driven with a desire to win and achieve her goals at any cost, she felt, for the first time, that something she truly wanted might actually be out of her reach. This left her distraught in a way that she never had been before. She had _always_ gotten what she wanted, and Wildrider had made sure that if she couldn't get it, he'd get it for her.

She trudged down the hallway, crestfallen, considering where she might have gone wrong. The vast wall of NO she had crashed into was teaching her a painful and poignant lesson: Impulsive, aggressive, demanding might not actually work sometimes. Drag Strip was so busy wallowing in self-pity that she didn't notice Shockwave until she ran into him.

"Watch where you're-" she cut off her angry retort as soon as she looked up into that glaring red eye. Instantly she trembled, stepping back, drawing her hands to her chest, afraid there might be some kind of violent repercussion for so clumsily bumping into one of Megatron's Lieutenants. She was all too familiar with the sort of punishment that could be handed down from above for that kind of misstep, no matter how innocently it might have occurred.

It also occurred to her that Shockwave was ... well built. Maybe she hadn't noticed it until just _now_, but he was broad shouldered, narrow of hip, his legs powerful, and the cannon on his arm was, simply put, _well-endowed_. Her vents opened, fanning excess internal heat.

"You appear to be in distress," Shockwave pointed out nonchalantly. "And curiously aroused."

Lack of subtlety, thy name was Shockwave. Drag Strip nearly offlined in embarrassment.

"W-well y-yes," she stammered, covering her optics with one hand, wishing she could transform into something so small it couldn't be seen without aid of an electron microscope. It was like admitting to Megatron's face that you had berth fantasies about him. The fallout would be positively thermonuclear.

"Your drive to generate must have been activated," Shockwave stated as if he were reading a stock report out loud. "My sensors indicate that your core temperature is elevated. Do you desire to interface with me?"

He did not just ask that. _He did not just ask that._ Drag Strip felt like her brainmodule had been hit by the fist of an angry god. She tried to answer - you didn't _not_ answer one of Megatron's Lieutenants no matter what horrifyingly frank questions they asked of you - but all that managed to pass her vocoder was a garbled, tiny squeak. Nevertheless, morbid curiosity and a desperate need to generate that wouldn't leave the top of her thought stack pressed her onwards. She swallowed and tried again, timidly answering in a tiny voice, "... yes?"

"Very well. Come with me to my quarters," Shockwave replied with a maddening, mind-breaking calm, turning around and walking towards the officer's deck, expecting Drag Strip to follow.

Her mouth hung open. She had to check to make sure her jaw had not fallen off and hit the floor.

She rebooted a few processes that had stalled with unexpected errors, quickly considering whether or not what she had just agreed to was actually, in fact, a good idea. This was _Shockwave_ we were talking about here. Did he actually _have_ a sex life? If so... what could it_ possibly_ be like? It seemed Drag Strip was going to find out. After all, she'd just agreed to interface with him, and she didn't think she could back out now even if she wanted to.

Gathering up her shattered notions of the purple mech's behavior from the floor, Drag Strip hurried along to catch up to Shockwave, watching the contours of his backside the whole way.

...

The hangar doors to the Nemesis opened as a black and violet helicopter left the open sky for the insides of the ship. Bay doors shutting down, Airachnid transformed and touched down on the floor of the hangar. Reporting in with the Vehicon quartermaster in charge of supplies, she made her request for more raw material and energon for Kickback, who was still back at the Insecticons' original hive location, tending his hatching pods. It was time to file the usual updates with Megatron concerning the hive master's progress in adding more Insecticons to the ranks, and since the spawning under her direction had been successful, she'd been cut a lot of slack. It didn't hurt that she was playing it safe, keeping ambition and attitude in check.

Making her way out of the hanger and through the halls of the ship, headed to the command center, she was passed by the female Stunticon Drag Strip, who seemed to be in a ridiculously good mood. The Formula-One racer's EMF was practically singing in a way Airachnid had never seen radiating off her before, not even when she'd beaten someone to a twisted mound of mesh or outraced an Autobot speedster. Was that a whiff of post-overload ozone she detected?

Airachnid paused, watching her skip down the hallway, beginning to suspect the cause for such an agreeable mood. She smirked and chuckled, continuing on her way. Good for the Stunticon! Maybe it would calm her down - though she suspected Wildrider would be tearing some poor red-painted glitch apart for it later.

"Knock Out, you devil," she laughed under her breath.

If only Airachnid knew.

...

"Starscream, you can stop hiding in your quarters," Megatron sighed over the comm channel. "Drag Strip has moved into the lower parts of the ship, and I need you HERE to handle communications until Soundwave can return to duty."

What a mess. Megatron slumped into his command chair, resting his chin against one hand, talons drumming against the arm rest of the other. Knock Out's suggestion of setting up a quarantine for Shiftlock and her offspring was something they should have done from the start. Admittedly Megatron's lack of interest in the intricacies of sparkling generation had left him woefully ignorant of the full ramifications of having a reproductively active female present in a closed environment such as the Nemesis. Phase Seven - the repopulation of the Cybertronian race after the war - seemed to be erupting into full swing around him even before the war was fully over.

The command doors opened and Airachnid stepped in, crossing the walkway over the lower weapons control and system deck and approaching the throne. She bowed and dropped to one knee, right arm crossed over her chest.

"Report, Airachnid," Megatron boredly addressed the fembot, his mind anywhere but on the day-to-day business of military operations.

"My Lord, the Insecticon repopulation project remains on schedule. We believe this batch may contain the revival of Hardshell and Sharpshot," Airachnid announced, raising her eyes to the silver gladiator enthroned before her.

Well, at least _that_ was good news. "Continue the project, then," Megatron answered, sitting back up. "I must advise you, however, that there is a situation developing on the Nemesis that may have an immediate effect on you."

That wasn't good. Was she in trouble?

"Recently we engaged in a hostage exchange with the Autobots, and acquired one of their females, Shiftlock, and her two sparklings as our prisoners. Unfortunately her presence has had some ... _unpredictable_ side effects on the rest of the crew," Megatron explained.

Airachnid raised an optic ridge. "What kind of side effects?" she asked almost a bit too bluntly.

"Shockwave informs me that a sparked female, or one who has recently given birth, can trigger a drive to generate in other females, particularly ones who have not borne sparklings for an extended period of time," Megatron continued. "Furthermore it can also trigger carriers to start producing blank protoforms. Our carriers have already been affected."

Airachnid couldn't help but laugh, though she quickly swallowed it under Megatron's withering glare.

"You are ordered to avoid contact or proximity to Shiftlock. Drag Strip has already been triggered."

"Of course, Lord Megatron," Airachnid agreed. Easy enough. This information explained to the spider why Drag Strip wasn't acting quite like herself as they passed in the hall. Though, if she was needy for generation, wouldn't she have been more irritable than happy?

Not having been dismissed, Airachnid looked up at Megatron expectantly, waiting on his next order or debriefing of the current events taking place within the faction. It was in looking at him a little longer than normal that she began to notice things about the gladiator she had not considered before.

His chest, so broad and strong and perfectly polished, accented by old battle scars that were a testament to his strength and virility. The power in his arms and legs, the perfection of his form that was beginning to tantalize her with its proximity. She began to smile slyly. Why try to get rid of Megatron when she could exert power over the Decepticons from _beneath_ him?

The shift on Airachnid's features didn't go unnoticed. "... Airachnid, what are you doing?" Megatron asked, uncertain how to react to the feeling of being undressed by her violet eyes.

"Admiring my most perfect Lord Megatron," she purred. "Am I not allowed the privilege of basking in your presence?"

Megatron inched back on his throne, optic ridges raising away from crimson eyes. Such flattery was something he expected from Starscream after the fool had done something to cross him. Airachnid's words were usually caustic with venom, not dripping with honey. "I ... suppose you are so allowed," he replied cautiously.

Airachnid stood and sauntered closer to Megatron, intentionally swaying her hips provocatively in front of him as she knelt at his feet, placing her hands on his legs, just above his knees.

"My Lord, the itsy bitsy spider would like to climb your water spout," she whispered huskily.


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note:**

**I could not accurately predict Megatron's reaction to Airachnid, so I_ literally_ flipped a coin for the results. If it seems OOC for him, blame the quarter.**

* * *

Starscream kept looking over his shoulder as he made his way to the command center. Drag Strip could be hiding around any corner, waiting to strike.

ANY CORNER.

Once he'd reached the safety of the command center (she wouldn't possibly try to frag him right in front of Megatron, right?), he vented a heavy sigh of relief. The nightmare would be over. At least for as long as his shift held out.

"Reporting for duty Lord Meg-"

Starscream developed a sudden tic under his right optic.

"AIRACHNID!" he shouted, hands curled into fists, arms raised and missiles primed, ready to attack at any moment. "What do you think you're doing to him!?"

He knew it, he just _knew_ it! Releasing that evil, wretched female was going to end up resulting in the deaths of more Decepticons, and now Airachnid was _clearly_ closing in for the kill on Megatron! He would have to save his Master (and thusly earn even more trust and good favor with him, of course)!

Except that Megatron didn't seem terribly concerned for his well being; in fact, was he – was he actually _smiling_? It dawned on Starscream at that moment that what he was looking at was not, in fact, an assassination attempt. Not with Airachnid in Megatron's lap like _that_. Not with the soft flutters of laughter, the hushed, breathy conversation, the way Megatron's hand was pressed against the small of the spider's back –

Starscream recoiled from the sight, aghast, covering his optics and spinning around. "S-sorry Lord Megatron, I had no idea you were busy!" he blurted out. It was like walking in on your parents in the middle of lovemaking. He'd have nightmares for vorns.

Airachnid chuckled, glancing over her shoulder at the horrified Seeker. "I think we've lost our privacy," she murmured.

"Mmm, yes, so it would seem," Megatron grinned. "My quarters, Airachnid. Be quick about it."

Airachnid slipped out of Megatron's lap, and he gave her aft a playful swat that made her yelp delightedly as she hurried out of the room. "You have command of the ship for the next, oh, four cycles, Starscream," he said cheerfully as he followed out after the spider. The Seeker watched, flabbergasted as Megatron left, stalking after Airachnid with a lusty glint in his optics.

"WHAT IS GOING ON AROUND HERE?" Starscream shouted into the empty room.

...

Shiftlock sat with her back against the wall of the spartan quarters she'd been assigned on. The Decepticon brands on her doorwings still stung. She hated how the violet color clashed with the copper orange of her armor. Autobot red had always been the better choice.

Nearby her sparklings slept on comfortable berths, having enjoyed their first energon rations and fallen into a well deserved recharge. Their wings bore purple insignia as well, freshly tattooed on. Shiftlock wanted to scrape the purple paint off with her fingers.

The door alert went off, a soft chime letting the occupants know that someone outside wanted in. Not wanting to wake her babies, she got up and went to the door controls, brushing a hand over the activation panels. Outside was a lone Vehicon. Shiftlock wondered why he was here.

"Hey, it's me," he said quietly, EMF adding _friend remember-me?_ frequencies as undercurrents to his speech.

Oh! She'd almost forgotten about him! So much had happened in such a short time; her nerves were frayed as old lamp cords and she was constantly on edge. She was just waiting for Megatron to find some way to kill her or go back on his promise and kill her children. The conversation she'd had with the Vehicon before had been buried deep in her memory files, nearly becoming junk data to be purged during her next defragmentation cycle. His appearance was a welcome distraction and relief; her spark ached for Jazz and at such a distance from him she imagined the discomfort and loneliness would only get worse.

"Come in, but speak quietly, the children are sleeping," Shiftlock whispered, moving aside to let the Vehicon in.

The Vehicon nodded and slipped inside the room as she closed the door. His visor flickered as he looked at the two sleeping younglings. "Wow," he whispered. "So that's them. I didn't think they'd be this big."

"You've never seen new Cybertronians, have you?" Shiftlock asked.

The Vehicon shook his head no. "I figured they'd be, you know, smaller. The natives have protoforms that grow, but slowly. Not in burst-transformations like Insecticons." His EMF was warm with adoration; seems he found them cute.

Everyone did. It seemed as if just being around the new babies had a profoundly pacifying effect even on the Decepticons, bringing out aspects of their sparks that had been shut down during millions of years of war, softening the hard edges and reminding them that there was more to existence than an endless drive for conquest.

"So did you pick a name?" Shiftlock asked, eager to see what sort of progress the Vehicon had made.

"Dave," he said. "I kinda like the name Dave."

Well it wasn't really very Cybertronian - no Ironhide, Skids or Perceptor - it was a native name, and it left Shiftlock a little curious as to his choice. Nevertheless it was a step in the right direction. She went to the table and chairs in the room, and pulled out a seat for Dave, settling in herself. "Is it safe for us to talk?" Shiftlock asked, remembering Soundwave's intense monitoring of everything aboard the Nemesis. Certainly her quarters would be watched in particular.

Dave's EMF wobbled with laughter. "That's just the thing! He's off-duty for awhile, and it's all because of _you_!"

Shiftlock stared. "What?"

"Well, word around the Nemesis has it that you're making all the carriers and females go glitched with your mom-waves. All the carriers are stuck in medical because they're making protoforms, and Drag Strip has been trying to grab every mech she sees because she wants sparklings too!" Dave said.

Shiftlock kept staring. "What?!"

"Barricade blew out both his optics he was so mad!" Dave snortled, his body trembling with laughter suppressed for the sake of the sparklings. He sat up for a moment, hand to the right side of his helm, listening in to something. "_No," _he gasped, his EMF wildly fluctuating with hilarity. "Oh you are not gonna believe this. One of us on the upper decks just saw Megatron chasing a giggling Airachnid down the hall and telling her he was going to 'face her so hard she wouldn't be able to walk on _any_ of her legs!"

Shiftlock's optics opened so wide they threatened to roll out onto her cheeks. "_What?!"_

Dave tried to compose himself. "You are causing more havoc on this ship than the time the big green guy blew out the power couplings and made us crash land, and you're supposed to be one of us!"

...

Knock Out stared at the results of the test on his data pad.

Drag Strip smiled. She smiled like Spongebob finding out Squidward liked Krabby Patties.

"W-well you are absolutely right, Drag Strip. You're sparked," he announced.

"You missed your chance," Drag Strip snorted, settling back into her normal, competitive, glitchy nature. "Too bad, so sad."

Knock Out raised an optic ridge. While he had entertained the notion of bumping her bumper before, her personality had ultimately been a turn off. The idea of being saddled with a femme that liked to grind his grill into the dirt every chance she got and thought it was 'cute' was more than he ever wanted to endure. That didn't even touch on the fact that her brother threatened to stomp a new exhaust port into anyone who so much as looked at her.

Which brought up the question of who did the deed, because it was more than likely Knock Out would end up repairing him very soon.

"Congratulations!" Blackout cheerfully interjected. "I am so happy for you! When my protoform is ready, you can be using it, yes?"

"Oh Blackout that's so kind of you!" Drag Strip replied, clasping her hands together, beaming. "I'm sure that will be very agreeable with my sparkling's father."

"So if it's not a secret, can I ask who that happens to be?" Knock Out questioned, uncertain he wanted to know, considering he'd seen her dragging Starscream around like a ragdoll before.

"Shockwave," Drag Strip answered blithely.

Barricade, who had been drinking an energon cube, promptly did a spit take. Soundwave turned over on his berth and seemed to stare even without eyes, a BSOD popping up in the corner of his vision. Blackout's optic ridges flipped up. "Ohhh that is being surprise."

"I'm sorry did you just say Shockwave?" Knock Out asked, datapad falling from his hands with a clatter on the floor plating. He partially rebooted, unable to process that information.

"My vocoder is working just fine thank you. Yes I said Shockwave. He's gentle and strong and it's like he knew how to do everything just right and then he brought out the cortical psychic patch and-"

"STOP!" all three speaking mechs said at once.

"That is way, way more than I wanted to know," Knock Out muttered, rubbing his face. "Just - congratulations. We'll leave it at congratulations."

* * *

**Oh the irony. As I'm writing the part about Megatron and Airachnid, my pandora station starts playing "How to Be Eaten by a Woman" by The Glitch Mob. Words fail me.**

**Also I keep hearing Blackout speaking with a Russian accent in my head, so he might start having a Russian accent in text.**


	8. Chapter 8

Wildrider's left optic twitched. "Y-y-you're...?!"

"Sparked!" Drag Strip exclaimed joyfully.

"Nice," Motormaster said, not looking up from his datapad magazine.

The Nemesis mess hall had become the favorite hang out of the Stunticons when they weren't on missions or recharging. The combiner team had a unique bond among its members, and they preferred to spend most of their free time together, like band of high school buddies, members of an extended family - or a pack of wolves. Having emerged from the Well of All-Sparks together - Wildrider and Drag Strip becoming split sparks soon after, like Sunstreaker and Sideswipe - they had only suffered a division in their ranks during the chaos of the last days of the Great War, with Breakdown making it onto the Nemesis and the rest of the Team lagging behind under heavy Autobot fire.

The loss of Breakdown had been painful for all of them (they had felt it the same as Dreadwing felt the loss of Skyquake) and there was a subtle sense of "missing" that had hung over all their heads since that time. It had only reinforced their desire to stay closer and connected.

Motormaster, the titan-class sixteen wheeler and leader of the team, had taken his usual spot at their favorite table, where the Stunticons could watch Earth television programs on the huge video monitor (one of the Vehicons had tinkered with it to allow reception of Earth broadcasts) that hung opposite the entrance arch. When not otherwise occupied, Motormaster was an avid reader of automobile magazines from earth, particularly any that had what he called "dames with massive wheel wells". He had also labeled his favorite chair, scratching "Property of Motormaster Do Not Sit In Or I Will Put My Foot So Far Up Your Aft You Will Think You Became A Combiner" on its back.

It hadn't been touched by anyone but him since then.

Dead End was passed out and slumped over the table, having taken one too many shots of high grade. He'd lost a lot of energon chips on that bet on Barricade.

Wildrider was standing near his sister, both of them not too far from Motormaster, and from the look on his mustached maroon face, someone was going to die. Soon. Painfully.

"Who did it?!" Wildrider snarled. "Who touched you?!"

"I did," a baritone voice answered from behind the two.

"All right _mech_," the gray stunticon snarled, whirling around to face the origin of the voice. "You just made the biggest mistake of your sorry-"

Drag Strip chuckled. "Oh don't worry about my brother, dear, he's just over protective. You know how split sparks can get."

Wildrider's plates rose and his engine choked and sputtered for a moment. "_SHOCKWAVE?!"_ He stared at his sister. "_Really_ sis? _Shockwave?_"

"HEY"! Drag Strip snapped, hands on her hips, "He's incredibly intelligent, he's high ranking, and he can kick a lot of aft! I think I did pretty well for myself!"

"Adding to the number of Decepticons present on this ship, and relieving Drag Strip of a condition that caused significant disruption in the ranks was a logical decision," Shockwave stated. He canted his head down towards the shorter yellow, black-striped fembot. "I received the medical report from Knock Out concerning the success of our generation." Placing his good hand on Drag Strip's shoulder, he added, "I am . . . happy."

Cue the sound effect of shattering glass, followed by slack-jawed, open mouthed expressions on Motormaster and Wildrider.

"Wait did you say you're happy?" Wildrider asked curiously.

"Well, we uh, we sort of ... bonded," Drag Strip said sheepishly.

"Correct," Shockwave said, continuing on Drag Strip's chain of thought (which more easily accomplished now), "While unexpected, the bond is vicariously feeding me emotional data from Drag Strip. While my own data has been artificially blocked, the bond between our sparks is overriding some of the firewalls. I do not possess the same level of emotional capacity I once did, but I have recovered a portion of it. As such, I am happy. Grateful. Proud."

"Well I'll be a scraplet's uncle," Motormaster said, surprised by the turn of events. "A Shockwave with feelings."

"Makes him scarier if you ask me," Wildrider muttered.

Motormaster rubbed his chin, rusty gears in his head cranking along. "If you bonded to her, I wonder ..."

Wildrider picked up what Motormaster was putting down. "The combiner bond?"

"Hmm," Shockwave thought aloud. "This bears some research."

"Well, you'd be the expert in that field," Drag Strip smiled. "Wouldn't it just be funny if...?"

"You'd make a weird leg," Motormaster said flatly.

...

Airachnid stared up at the ceiling, her fans puffing away heat. "Did we just...?"

"It would appear so," Megatron replied with an uncertain tone to his voice as he lay beside Airachnid on the berth.

The spider sighed. "Well that was short-lived." She could feel flicker of wounded pride bristling from the newly formed bond with the titan-frame she was snuggled up against. She laughed, he felt like pouting sparkling who'd had his hand slapped! "No, no!" she quickly exclaimed amid flutters of charmed laughter. "I didn't mean _that_, I meant my being unbonded!"

This relieved him - he was a very proud being and it seemed he craved having his ego stroked. He hated thinking of himself as anything other than the best of the best. Airachnid had always suspected, but before she had direct access to the layers of Megatron that existed beneath the terrifying facade of the conquering warlord, master of all Decepticons, she could not have been certain of it.

What a situation to be in. Overwhelmed with a raging lust she didn't know she could ever _have_, Airachnid had gone after the most impressive mech she could find - and he had surprisingly (and enthusiastically) responded to her come-on. Not that she hadn't entertained the notion of going after Megatron in the back of her mind; he cut a fine figure, his power was undeniable, and she would never find herself at a loss for intellectual challenge - she had simply never been able to give it more than a passing thought. Not since Tarantulas had forced her into a bond with him. This bond, accidental as its creation had been, was _different._ It felt different. It felt natural and relaxed, not an oppressive voice in the back of her processes that lurked like a sexual predator waiting to strike. This was much better.

She could sense some concern lingering in Megatron, and she shared it; this had not been of their choice, and given the option, they both would have liked to have avoid being bonded. Nevertheless, it was done - and they were left to make the best of their impulsive actions.

"Should we tell anyone?" Airachnid asked.

"It will come out eventually," Megatron replied. "But discretion would be advisable until it is no longer avoidable. Our bond could be exploited."

"Agreed," the spider said. An amusing though tickled her processors. "Can you imagine the look on Starscream's face when he finds out?"

There was quiet for just a moment, Megatron's expression inscrutable, and then it happened: He began to laugh. Not the sort of malevolent, maniacal laughter that was usually the only kind of mirth that passed his lips - this was genuine, rolling laughter from deep in that barrel chest, borne from finding honest frame-rattling humor in imagining how badly Starscream would twitch. Airachnid found herself caught up in it and joined him, and the two continued to mentally roll in the hilarity of it all for several minutes onward.

Pleasant emotions bounced back and forth between their sparks, the feedback loop enhancing the sensations each was feeling. The uncertainty gave way to peaceful acceptance. Maybe even happiness.

Megatron's hand gently took Airachnid's, her delicate digits enclosed within the mass of his larger servo. "No one will harm you again, Airachnid. Not even myself," he said softly, a note of humor and apology in his EMF.

"And you need never worry about me trying to fly the ship away without you, or take your place," Airachnid responded, sharing the sentiment.

"I suppose this is _one_ way to assure your loyalty," he quipped, grinning.

"Well, if loyalty comes with a lead-up like before..." Airachnid saucily purred, turning over and resting herself partially atop the much larger mech's chest.

She looked startled, and Megatron could feel her surprise. "What is it?" he asked.

"Your eyes!" she said, her voice taking on a hushed tone. "They're _blue_."

* * *

**Author's notes:**

**Blackout is Heavy Weapons Guy. I apologize in advance but it's now stuck permanently in my head. XD**

**I did not actually intend for this episode to have Decepticon pairings happen, but sometimes the story moves in mysterious ways! This IS building up to something - something BIG.**

**The chapter is a little short because the next segment of story would push this chapter up past 3000+ words and I want to have it out before the weekend.**

**Good luck hiding that bond from the kids now, Megatron. Also, your Vehicons are getting restless...**

**Vehicon Theme: "The Hand That Feeds" - NIN **


	9. Chapter 9

*.*.*.*.*

**Chapter 9**

*.*.*.*.*

_This is not the world my father knew.  
This is not the world I know  
he would have wanted me to build,  
But I can't undo it now.  
It's like a train, and all its cars are filled with steel,  
that I would stop if I knew how,  
and it is bearing down on me..._

_"Here Comes The Arm" - The Protomen_

* * *

Megatron looked at himself in the polished metal in the corner of his quarters that served as a mirror. He'd positioned it so that when he was in power-down, opening one optic could allow him to view into the one blind spot of the room. The price of power had been constant vigilance against assassination attempts or attacks.

Airachnid was right; his optics had cleared themselves of the red-violet haze of so many vorns of dark energon dependence and bottomless rage. He was left to fathom how it had happened. He could only guess it was a side effect of their unintended sparkbond, and the surge of positive emotions that had bled over into him through it.

Happiness. Had he ever truly known happiness? He tried to think back, as far as he could remember, and he could not recall a time when he had ever tasted the peace and satisfaction with life that could let such a feeling sprout in the peaked, worn-out soil of his existence. All he had known was the bitter taste of injustice and oppression as he slowly ground down his health and strength in endless, monotonous toil. Only the gladiator pits had afforded him anything close to satisfaction, but peace had not been there. It was only strength of will, bolstering fragile hope, that gave him the desire not just to live, but to fight. Only in being made to slaughter others like himself, watching the bodies of fallen coworkers and low-castes like himself be gathered up for recycling and exsanguination while the winners were cheered and adored by those who called themselves his betters, had he learned the value of life.

Life was cheap. Energon could be spilled freely, if it was necessary to do so.

He had not always believed in the necessity of spilling energon. His mind was keen and he scraped together what he could of his allotment of pay, cutting back on energon rations so that he could publish a plea for reason in the form of an intellectual appeal: a treatise on the decent of Cybertronian society into stagnation and madness that he and millions of others suffered under every cycle of their lives. The manifesto took off like wildfire, faster and farther than he had initially expected, and with it, came retribution from those who held ultimate power. He had been laboring under the illusion of free speech and his efforts were repaid the night an enforcer, a rotorframe who had been maimed by empurata, arrested him without charges and beat him so badly he had nearly died. The only way to truly change the word, he had reasoned as he lay on the jail cell, leaking and broken, was to do it by force. There would be no reasoning with the senate or Sentinel Zeta Prime.

Then there was Pax.

Optimus Prime, then Orion Pax, had listened to him - here was a higher caste, moved by his words. He understood. He questioned the status quo. He believed as Megatron did, that something had to change before everything snapped. Dissidents were beginning to vanish: Pious Maximus, once a leader of Functionists, was openly renouncing the guilds and questioning the caste system - and then he had disappeared, never to be heard from again. Others simply took 'vacations' and returned with their views suddenly and suspiciously in lock-step with that of the Council. At that time Senator Shockwave was one of the few that stood with the growing movement he had fostered; this movement was dubbed 'Decepticons' by the state-run media for touting one of the lines from his manifesto: "_You are being deceived._".

Pax. The closest thing to a brother he had ever had.

He should have been happy his protege and friend had been named Prime; all he could see was that with Pax's weak-servoed talk, there would not be change - only platitudes and empty sentiment. The Council wanted him, as Soundwave had told him from information gathered among the Senators by his minicon agents, because he was Iaconian - one of their own - and they believed they could manipulate him towards their own ends. He feared that everything they had worked for, the revolution that was barreling down on them in the moment they forced their way into the Senate floor (and in doing so risked execution by Triorian Guards every moment they were there) was going to end up dead before it could be sparked, or worse yet, as corrupted as the Senate itself. He felt betrayed, abandoned ... crushed. Slaughtering the Senators not loyal to his cause and fomenting civil war seemed the only path left to save Cybertron and all its inhabitants.

Yet, it had not been until he stood in front of the mirror, his contemplative mind wrapped in the warm, fuzzy haze of post-overload bliss, that he began to wonder if the path he had chosen was _wrong_.

In the bond that had been established with Airachnid in their impassioned joining, the gift of empathy had been sledgehammered against the wall of cold, merciless rationale Megatron had built around his mind to shelter him from the reality of his actions. Seeing into Airachnid's past, understanding her actions against him through those violet optics, were breaking down his excuses and his reasonings, illumination shooting in through the cracks in that mental wall. She, too, knew suffering under the caste system and the senate; for a few seconds he felt the clutching control of Tarantulas' insanity as if the ancient creature had bonded to him.

He felt all the fear and loathing she'd had for him.

"Is this what I have built?" he asked himself out loud, staring back into blue optics he had not seen in vorns.

Airachnid slid off the berth and walked over to Megatron. He could feel her questioning him; she had sensed his inner conflict and contemplation and had offered him silence enough to think. "My Lord?" she asked.

"No," he corrected in a moment of self-loathing. "You of all people needn't call me that, not now."

She was somewhat confused by this display of humility but accepted it, standing at his side. Tentatively she reached up and took hold of his hand once more.

He did not push her away; the feeling of having her closer to him was pleasant, reassuring. Was this what bond-mates felt? Was this why it was so easy to torture them just by separating them for long periods of time? Was this why, when he slew one on the field of battle, the other often died soon afterwards, even when there had not been any damage done?

The silent question of _what have I done?_ flitted like a black moth against the lightbulb of his processes, ghost data that lingered hauntingly from all the times he'd crushed it in the past. He could not afford to stop; the avalanche had started, the pebbles could no longer vote. He had chained himself to his own fate from the moment Cybertron's amusement park - a playground for the higher castes only - had been bombed, killing thousands, in his name. Even if he was willing to risk madness from staring at the ashes he'd left in his wake, he could not for a second stop the war. His followers, honed over millennia to be capable of any atrocity, who had been born in blood and nursed on ambition, would tear him in pieces and grow like a cancer out of control until they consumed themselves and anything else they touched. There would be no revival of Cybertron, no Phase Seven repopulation, because his army of destroyers knew nothing else. He had been the only thing keeping them in check, and the only way he could imagine making them stop would be to annihilate everything and everyone he had made.

As if Airachnid was somehow privy to his internal struggle, she asked, "What do we do now?"

'We'.

They were in this together now, weren't they?

...

Dave stared at the table.

In a cycle Shiftlock had shown him Cybertron's past through a direct data exchange of her memories.

In two cycles he had read all of Megatronus' - not _Megatron's _- manifestos and political publications.

In three cycles Shiftlock had countered all of his angry, disbelieving arguments with fact, logic and reason.

In four cycles, Dave had compiled the summary of what he'd learned into a report, and passed it to every genericon aboard the Nemesis.

"It's all over the place," Dave said, looking back up. "You just started a real scrap-storm across the ship."

"Truth has that effect after it's been suppressed for a long time," Shiftlock replied. "What are the reactions?"

"Anger. Outrage. Some of us want to rebel, some of them are scared, some of them are depressed," Dave said.

"Tell them not to act on their own, not yet. We need to be organized, and the best place for all of us to be is off this ship," Shiftlock explained. "I don't want this to be like running a herd of petrorabbits off a cliff, you're all living, thinking Cybertronians, you deserve to live. That means we think 'escape', not 'fight'."

"We're not afraid to fight," Dave said, a smile on his EMF. "You realize how often one of us gets picked off by Megatron just because he didn't like how we answered a question? How about in combat against you Autobots?"

"Point made," Shiftlock said with a remorseful smile. "Still, we need a plan to minimize loss of life and get us off this ship."

"I think I can do that," Dave said. "We just bring communications down, we seal off the doors, and get control of the ship. We can force a landing and get out." He stopped for a moment and asked after thinking about it, "Where are we gonna go?"

"You can come with me. All of you," Shiftlock said, reaching over and placing her hand over Dave's.

"... The Autobots would take us in?" Dave asked, sounding shocked.

"I know they would," the Wrecker said.

...

"How much longer do we have to waaaait?" Barricade whined, already chafing at his medically ordered bedrest.

"You keep complaining and I'll just drop you into stasis until you're done," Knock Out grunted, keeping an eye on the medical monitors.

Suddenly the room darkened. Emergency power cells and lighting kicked on.

"What in the-?" Knock Out asked as Soundwave, Barricade and Blackout sat up from their berths. He pressed a button on the medical bay's main control console. "This is medical to the bridge, what in the scrap is going on?"

No response.

"I _said_, this is medical to the bridge!"

Static.

"Okay I am not gonna sit this one out," Barricade growled, hopping down and tearing off the monitoring cables. He marched straight to the door - and ran face first into it as it refused to open. Temper flaring, he slammed his fist against the door several times before giving up.

"We're stuck in here!" he snarled.

"I can _see _that," Knock Out retorted irritably. "Comm systems are down, power's out and the door systems are locked down. None of you get any bright ideas about shooting out walls, your bodies are entirely focused on the protoforms, your weapons systems and power systems are at half capacity if even that."

The main computer's monitor filled with static, and a clip of what appeared to be a native video started to play across the screen.

_"Look, the people you are after are the people you depend on. We cook your meals. We haul your trash. We connect your calls. We drive your ambulances. We guard you while you sleep. Do **not** **** __with us."_

* * *

**A little Adventure now that we've had Humor!**

**Empurata: Removal of the head and hands of a criminal and replacing them with a boxy, single-optic head and usually blunt claw-like hands. Used to permanently mark a criminal. Known victims: Whirl, Shockwave.**

**Functionism: The belief that your alt-form determines your function in society, and thusly your caste and potential for advancement. Enforced by the Guilds and Senate. Originated with Nova Prime.**


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Notes: Trying a slightly new way of formatting chapters (I've been influenced by Bibliotecaria.D's very professional looking presentation). I think I'm also going to end each episode with an Author's section to wrap up loose plot ends and give some insight into why I had certain things happen as they did. A few shout-outs to my wonderful readers and reviewers won't hurt either. :D**

**I took a little break for Mother's Day (we moms enjoy a day of rest every so often). Back to the action!**

* * *

*.*.*.*.*

Chapter 10

*.*.*.*.*

The fusion cannon on the end of Megatron's arm gave off wisps of fuscia-colored plasma vapors after the discharge of several weapon bursts. The door remained sealed, though the exterior bore fresh new char marks, the metal fading from cherry red to gray as the heat dissipated.

"Reinforced door?" Airachnid asked.

"Of course," Megatron replied. "How else was I to recharge soundly?"

"Well, we won't be able to blast our way out. I guess that just leaves the ventilation systems. I'm probably the only one on this ship small enough to fit into them," the spider said. "Give me a boost?" she asked.

The room was nearly pitch black, only the power lines and alt-form lighting systems of the two bots in the room providing any light. The power had gone out and the doors sealed, and neither had been able to raise communications. The only message they had received was the same clip of an Earth video like everyone else. It wasn't a good sign.

Holding Airachnid by the waist, the Decepticon leader raised her to the ceiling; she unfastened the grate on the ventilation system, and using her webbing, pulled herself up into the shaft. "I'll see if I can get out and get the door open from the outside. If nothing else, I'll find out what's going on."

"Exercise caution, Airachnid. This smells of revolt," Megatron warned, concerned for the spider's safety.

"I thought the same," she replied as she steeled herself into focused mindset of a hunter. "You can at least count on me to fight at your side. If I had planned ill for you, you'd have known it long before this sudden power outage."

Megatron smirked. "Indeed. But what of the Insecticons? I know now you have no control over Kickback other than familial sentiment."

"Which is stronger than you think," Airachnid said pointedly. "The Insecticons are still at your side."

"You _hope_," Megatron retorted gently. "Kickback and his hive think of you as their mother, but would they now think as well of me as you? Our bond does not guarantee Kickback will accept me as some sort of father."

Airachnid chuckled sweetly at the mech's naivete`. It was to be expected to a degree; how could one mech understand the views each individual in his vast army held towards him? "Then you know him less than you think. When he was just a youngling, you were the closest thing to a father he had. There may be more loyalty yet than you know."

It did come as something of a surprise to him that anyone in the Decepticons could look to him in that way, but he had to consider that he had always worked with grown mechs - not children. A small part of him hoped that Kickback still had some positive feeling for him. He was going to need help bringing his monsters to heel. "Primus speed, Airachnid."

"Thank you," she whispered appreciatively before disappearing into the ductwork.

...

"LET ME GO YOU INSUFFERABLE WRETCHES!" Starscream shrieked, writhing against his bonds while lying on the walkway of the command center. "I WILL TEAR OUT YOUR SPARKS FOR THIS!"

The Air Commander was quickly silenced by a sharp, brutal kick to the head from a tank-alt Vehicon.

"Y'know, that wasn't a terribly smart thing to say," a rotorcraft Vehicon, marked with three red bars painted across his Decepticon insignia, said as he crouched down near Starscream, who was leaking from a tear in his facial mesh. "How long did you guys think you were gonna be able to keep beating and killing us every time you had a temper tantrum? Didn't you think we'd get sick of it after awhile?" He stood up and moved away from Starscream, just in case the Seeker had any tricks in mind. "The "glorious" Decepticon revolution? Don't make me laugh. You just wanted to trade one corrupt prime for another."

The shock of that statement hit Starscream like a bucket of ice water. "Wait - why would you think that?!" he gasped. "We were trying to take power back from the Autobots who wanted to control Cybertron for themselves!" That had always been the propaganda line. That had always been what they told the warborn Decepticons; the Vehicons had been one of the last waves of Cybertronians sparked before the Allspark ejected - and their had not been so numerous as the wave of Autobots that were the last generation.

"We read the book," said a tanker Vehicon, the tesla coils on his shoulders sizzling with energy.

The book? What did they mean by -

The seeker's optic lenses shrunk and his mouth opened in horrified realization. The book. _Megatron's book_. They must have found a copy and suddenly thought themselves an oppressed lower class! Certainly if you looked _objectively_ at their situation they were right, but this was a conquering army, there had to be order in the ranks, discipline, sacrificing the pawns at the front lines to achieve victory - it was sound military strategy! How could they simply turn aside after all these vorns just from reading a** book**?

Immediately Megatron's words echoed in his processes: _ If I must personally take each Cybertronian by the neck and crush them until they at last rise against me, learn to fight, learn never to be yoked by an oppressor again, **so be it**!_

It was happening. By the Allspark, _it was happening_.

...

Motormaster dropped to the floor, vents flared open to the full, sucking in ragged gusts of cold air and spluttering out heat mingled with mists of energon from internal injuries. He tried to force himself back onto his feet, his gears grinding and the metal of damaged joints creaking ominously, before his limbs trembled and gave out. Wildrider and Dead End had been knocked into stasis lock by the heavy blows of tank vehicons, while the sniper rotorcraft Vehicons had shot out Motormaster's hands and joints, crippling him. Shockwave was being bound, his optic shattered in one clean shot, the thick cable to his fusion cannon split in two. Drag Strip refused to leave his side and he had commanded her not to fight, not to risk their generating sparkling. He had shielded her with his larger frame until they had been surrounded.

When did the Vehicons ever get this good, or this organized? When did they ever fight this hard? Shockwave did not understand it. The sudden blackout in the mess hall followed by the broadcast made no sense to him. He could not determine who had caused the rebellion with communications down, though he strongly suspected Starscream had perhaps persuaded the Vehicons to turn on the Decepticon officers in a strategic coup.

"The ship's secure," one of the femme cycle Vehicons said to someone entering the room. Blind, Shockwave could not tell who the Vehicon could be speaking to. He waited, expecting to hear Starscream's voice.

"Casualties?" asked a female voice. Wait - could that be -?

"Few, fortunately. We were prepared to make sacrifices but the vast number of us are alive thanks to you," the Vehicon said again. "We owe you our lives and freedom, Shiftlock."

"All I did was give you a history lesson. You saved yourselves," the Wrecker said.

"Shockwave was actually protecting the Stunticon," the gruff voice of a tanker Vehicon reported.

Shiftlock looked surprised. That was not what she recalled from all the battles the Wreckers had with him on Cybertron. He would sooner have sacrificed everyone in an installation than let himself ever be taken. Self-sacrifice had not been part of his observable modus operandi. The McLaren walked closer to the bowed purple mech and the yellow femme clinging tightly, protectively to him.

"What gives?" she questioned suspiciously. "It's not like you to give a scrap about other Decepticons, Shockwave."

"Leave him alone!" Drag Strip shouted angrily. "He's my _mate_. He was trying to protect me!"

Shift had to blink several times before that finished computing. "Did you just say "mate"?"

"She is correct," Shockwave stated. His voice was tremulous as he continued, "She is my mate. I beg of you, do not harm her. She is sparked."

Shiftlock stared blankly at Shockwave. Shockwave has a mate? Shockwave is begging for her life? Her sparkling might be Shockwave's- ERROR. Does not compute. Divide by zero. Brain dot exe has generated a production fault and the system will shut down. Rebooting system.

A red Vehicon nudged Shiftlock. "Pssst. You're the ranking officer of this rebellion. Your call."

The femme shook her head, getting her processes back online. "Right. Thanks Dave."

"When we get loose you're gonna regret you ever came out of the well!" Motormaster snarled. A tanker Vehicon abruptly slugged him across the mouth, silencing the huge brute.

"Look, we're in control of this ship right now. We control the power core, the door systems, communication lines, even the navigation systems in the control center of the ship. Every officer and Insecticon is either neutralized or locked down without possibility of escape," Shiftlock explained, hands on her hips. "You want me to go Prowl on you? The tactically wise thing to do right now would be to just start lining you all up and executing you DJD-style. I don't think even Prime would chew me out for ending the war like that - bring home the Nemesis with a cargo bay full of gunmetal gray Decepticon elites."

"But I don't transform and roll out that way. I don't kill sparked femmes - I know some Wreckers that would have no problem pulling banana boat's spark out and smashing it in their hands just to let Shockwave hear her scream, as repayment for all the horror he's inflicted on other Wreckers - but I'm not gonna do that. Revenge is just too damn easy, and all it does is breed more revenge."

Shiftlock looked to Dave. "Tell Skippy on the bridge to open up communications on the ship and see if we can get Autobot HQ on the line. I want all the Cons in on this little conference call. We're reopening hostage negotiations with Megatron - on _my_ terms."

* * *

**So apparently in the Transformers Prime game there are further Vehicon frame types besides ground-type, car-jet and the silver-gray Seeker types: There are also Tankers (which haul energon like gasoline trucks), Tanks and Helicopter types as well. I also saw a fascinating fan-made female Vehicon motorcycle-frame design that was just too cool not to include. Female Vehicons for the win. :)**

**Next chapter should be the finale for this episode - with a new episode starting soon after. I need to go back and finish Brat!; I had a bit of writer's block on it, but I think I can get back to it now.**


	11. Note

**Quick update: I'm recovering from a severe lower back strain and I'm on some pretty strong medications; I won't be able to update for a week or so. Pain pills make me a bit loopy! I'll be back and writing as soon as I can. Thank you all!**


	12. Chapter 12

**So I'm back on my feet at last! I'm trying to get back in the saddle when it comes to writing. Thank you all for being so patient with me as I recover.**

**The new episodes of TF Prime have been HIGHLY entertaining, and unfortunately they are making my stories so AU it hurts! XD Such is the risk you take when you start writing before a season (or series) comes to an end.**

* * *

*.*.*.*.*

**Chapter 11**

*.*.*.*.*

"Optimus?" Ratched asked in incredulity, "We're getting a transmission from the Decepticon warship. It … it's _Shiftlock_."

This caused an immediate stir on the base. Shiftlock had only been gone for a single "day", as the Human species marked time on their planet, and already she was making contact? Team Prime, as well as the recent group of Ark survivors and Wreckers that had rejoined their Autobot cohorts, gathered close to the communications panel. Agent Fowler, Captain Fairborne, June and the three children, on a mezzanine above the central command pit the Autobots occupied, also drew in closer, expectant but nervous.

"Open the channel," Prime commanded.

"Greetings Prime!" Shiftlock responded. "This is temporary captain Shiftlock of the Nemesis, and my first mate Dave, head of the Vehicon Revolutionary Forces. We'd like to re-enter hostage negotiations with the Decepticons and yourselves."

"Shiftlock!" Jazz exclaimed, pressing forward to the screen, his spark pounding in his torso, "Are you all right? Are the kids okay?!"

"We're all fine, baby," she grinned. "Although the kids might be a little traumatized, Megatron had them convinced he's their father and the Autobots are evil – I see that look on your face, relax, it'll be fine. Nothing happened to them other than a little miseducation and some purple paint. You'll notice they did the same to me. It comes off."

"You said something about 'Vehicon Revolutionary Forces'?" Prime asked, sounding a little confused.

"Yeaaah, about that," Shiftlock said, bringing the red-painted car-frame Vehicon over into view of the camera. "You think we can house a thousand or so Vehicons that are tired of being oppressed, low-caste drones under the Decepticon whip?"

Ultra Magnus, Prime, Prowl and Ironhide looked amongst each other, just as confused and unsettled as before. A faint smirk pulled at Ironhide's lips and there was a hopeful sparkle in Prime's optics.

"Well, we've got the room," Fowler pointed out. "The expansions should be able to take them in."

"The biggest problem is going to be getting the energon they need," Captain Fairborne pointed out thoughtfully. "We don't have a large supply.

"We're the ones working the Decepticon energon mines," Dave suggested. "If you can help us defend a couple, we'll have all we need. You too."

"That would be a significant advantage," Prowl mused, rubbing his chin, processing the information. "That is, if the Vehicons can be trusted."

"Indeed," Ultra Magnus added. "How did this little insurrection of yours come to be, Lieutentant Shiftlock?"

"Well, I'd like to say it's all due to my amazing, awesome skills as a Wrecker, but I'd be lying, Sir," Shiftlock answered with a helpless smile, remembering her military protocol around the straight-laced Autobot Second-in-Command. "Things just sort of went, well, _crazy_ as soon as I came on. Ratchet, you're gonna need some kind of EMF quarantine room for my sparklings and myself. Keep us well away from the other females on base - apparently sparked females and new mothers have some pretty strong effects on other members of the species."

Ratchet blinked. It had been so long since he dealt with the generation of a new Cybertronian that he'd almost forgotten about the cascade effect it could have on other females and carriers. He began to laugh.

"Doctor?" Ultra Magnus asked, sounding confused.

"Oh _no_," Ratchet chuckled, hand over his optics, trying to hide the ever-widening smile across his facial mesh. "Don't tell me that the female Decepticons onboard started getting aggressive about generation," he asked, knowing full well the answer Shiftlock would give him.

"Ohhhh yeah. Drag Strip and Shockwave are mates now, apparently. Successful generation I might add. Some of the other Vehicons informed me that Megatron and Airachnid were also a bit, ah, 'indisposed'," Shiftlock reported.

Reactions to _that _bit of news ranged from laughter to disbelief to groans of disgust.

Optimus Prime, however, seemed to be deep in thought over the whole matter. Sparkbonds and generation among the Decepticon ranks after so long - what sort of effect would it have on all of them? The Vehicons as a collective frame-type were rebelling in a sort of cosmic irony against the very rebels who had started the Great War so many millions of years ago.

He wished Alpha Trion were here. He could certainly use some sage advice, because the situation was beginning to sound like a means of finally establishing a peace so elusive it had all but become mythological.

"The carriers are all laid up too," Shiftlock continued after the conversation bot-side had died down. "Soundwave, Blackout and Barricade are all locked down in medical generating protoforms."

"Fantastic!" Ratchet exclaimed. "For _once_ we have the upper hand!"

"And we'll need to act swiftly if we're going to use it," Ultra Magnus said.

"Agreed," Optimus Prime added. "Shiftlock, are you and the Vehicons able to land the Nemesis?"

"Yeah, we should be able to do that," she nodded. "Sir? I believe there's something you need to take into consideration in all this. I know it's not my place to give tactical advice or anything, but I don't think my conscience would let me rest if I didn't point out that we're not just dealing with enemy prisoners right now. We're dealing with _families_. Shockwave seems to have recovered some emotional capacity - sir, he was defending Drag Strip and begging us to spare her life."

Silence fell on the Autobot side of the line.

Reactions to this information were mixed, though the bots kept their thoughts to themselves for the most part. Some thought it a trick. Others didn't want to accept the fact that Shockwave might be redeemable; they'd fought him for so long, been subject to his experimentation and horrors for so long that forgiveness had been extinguished from their sparks. Old wounds and grudges nursed into ripe old age were not likely to die quickly or easily.

No one knew this more than Prime. If this was truly the first step towards peace, then the real battle - reconciliation and restoration - was about to begin.

"Shiftlock, I would like to speak with Megatron, if possible," he said, at last breaching the uneasy silence.

"Can do," Shiftlock replied.

...

"It's no good," Airachnid said from the ventilation shaft's opening in the ceiling. "I can't get the door override to work."

Megatron vented in frustration. "You tried. That's good enough." Trapped in his own quarters, held hostage by his own minions. This was _not_ how he thought it would end.

"What now, then?" Airachnid asked. "I suppose I could try to make my way to the ship's control room-"

"_No,_" Megatron sharply ordered. "Stay here."

Airachnid raised an optic ridge, uncertain how to respond to both the order and the tone in which it was given. Wouldn't Megatron normally have no issue with ordering his subordinates to do whatever it took to get him back in control?

Her pause told him everything he needed to know about what might be on her mind. "Sending you to the control room would be a fool's errand," he explained. "Even if you managed to get control of the ship it would come at a cost, and at too great a risk. You are a canny hunter, Airachnid, but even you cannot survive against overwhelming numbers. The tables are turned. Now it is _we_ who are outnumbered a thousand to one."

"Are you saying you don't want me to risk myself against the Vehicons?" Airachnid asked, trying to make certain she understood what she thought she just heard.

Megatron looked back up at her, those newly blue optics still snatching a pulse of her spark every time they caught hers. "I don't want you to risk yourself, period," he explained.

Gingerly Airachnid lowered herself out of the vent, slipping easily out, her extra limbs holding onto the interior of the vent, lowering her as if she were on a multi-cable harness. She dropped to the floor, legs tucking down against her back. "I - I've never known you to be concerned for the wellfare of anyone other than what is strategically advantageous to you," she said with uncertainty in her body language.

Megatron smirked. "Would you prefer me to say that I did not wish to risk damage to myself through our sparkbond?"

Airachnid rested a hand on her right hip and smirked, barking a short laugh. "It would be easier to believe."

"I would not have chased after you if I had not thought the potential repercussions of our liaison to be unacceptable," the silver mech casually commented. Airachnid's limbs twitched, flustered - he apparently had known exactly what he was doing, where as she was running on vorns of repressed code function.

Prime's voice ruined the moment. _*Megatron, this is Optimus Prime. It has been brought to our attention that your warship has usurped by an uprising among your crew. I would like to discuss the possibility of negotiating a peaceful end to this situation.*_

The leader of the Decepticons looked up towards the origin of the transmission, a holographic display beamed from an optic sensor above the door. His hand went to Airachnid's shoulder. "It would seem you have me at your disposal, Prime. State your terms."

There was a flicker of surprise in Prime's optics before he spoke once more. _*Let the Vehicons, Shiftlock and her children leave the Nemesis peacefully, and they will return control of the ship to you and the other Decepticons.*_

"You are asking me to divest myself of over half my army, along with nearly every scrap of Decepticon intelligence, with no guarantees that you will not simply turn around and destroy me at your leisure," Megatron countered. "You should have asked for my unconditional surrender instead. It would be far more prudent of me to agree to your terms just long enough to begin executing every last Decepticon officer before turning my fusion cannon on myself. I will not permit us to be humiliated, imprisoned or tortured by you and your kind, Prime."

Optimus' mouth tightened. _*Would you really terminate your followers, even when some are now in generation?*_

Now it was Megatron's turn to look shocked. "What?"

Ratchet's image formed next to Optimus' on the holographic video display. _*We've been informed by Drag Strip that she is sparked, and if the information we've been given about you and Airachnid's involvement is correct I would suggest she be tested for generation as well.* _The old medic made his suggestion with all the grace and delicacy of a drunken elephant getting off a carnival ride. Airachnid's optics widened and her engine hitched; he could very well be right. Her gaze snapped up to Megatron, whose only reaction was the nonplussed twitch of his right optic as he considered his options.

_*I am not interested in seeing you or any of the other Decepticons dead, Megatron,*_ Prime argued. _*You know that Autobots keep their word when it's given. We are willing to offer a ceasefire in exchange for the safe exit of our comrades and the freedom of the Vehicons.*_

"Oh I am certain you would keep your word, Prime. Perhaps you would even be able to keep your allies from indulging long-awaited revenge," Megatron stated calmly. "But by virtue of numbers alone you would have shifted the course of the war. No matter what option of yours I choose, I am still choosing defeat, either now or at some point further down the line."

The silver mech clasped his hands behind his back, glaring unflinchingly into the camera, into where he imagined Prime was looking at him from the other side of the communication lines. "The real question is whether or not I am willing to suffer an existence under your victory - or whether my fellow Decepticons would allow me to surrender and live."

He could hear the Autobots murmuring on the other end of the line; had they never considered such an outcome? They had known of the many times his own ranks had attempted to oust him to try to pry leadership from his cold, sparkless servos, but had they never thought that the Decepticons were so individually avaricious that they would see his surrender as weakness and carry on the war with or without him? Did they not realize that he was the dam holding back and channeling the destructive power of the dark side of the Cybertronian heart?

...

"He has a point," Ratchet said, turning away from the monitor to the others. "With what we know of how the Decepticon ranks operate, there is the very real possibility that if Megatron surrendered, some other Decepticon would simply carry on in his stead - whether or not they decided to snuff out his spark."

"So even if he wanted to surrender, he's trapped by his own army," Smokescreen mused, grasping the situation in its entirety.

"We'd always operated under the assumption that the Decepticons were a cult of personality," Prowl said. "Everything was centered around Megatron's power and influence over others. Starscream and Shockwave were always likely candidates to continue the Decepticon cause if Megatron fell, but it never seemed as if either of them had the charisma to hold the Decepticon army together in Megatron's absence."

_*No offense, Prowl, but that's because you've never been a Decepticon,* _Shiftlock said over the Autobot frequencies. _*There are plenty of 'Cons that are there because they're just glitched psychopaths, but the movement started for viable reasons - reasons that even Optimus agreed with at one point. The Autobots always seemed like enforcers of the status quo. We saw you as 'Corrupt Senate 2.0'.*_

"Then what hope do we have of ever ending this war?" Smokescreen asked, frustrated. "If Megatron gives up and the other Decepticons just keep fighting down to the last mech, that's not a victory, it's just and endless series of executions!"

"It's still victory, even if it's under unpleasant terms," Prowl rebuffed flatly. "And frankly Shiftlock, the fact that you _were_ a Decepticon gives your input on this matter a bias that is not necessarily helpful to making sound decisions. Your sympathies towards the Decepticons even during the thick of the war were questionable at best."

*_That's because I kept in mind that they were Cybertronians, not pieces of data in battlefield calculations, you Praxian gearstick!_* Shiftlock snapped angrily.

"Are we really gonna start arguin' in the middle of hostage negotiations?" Jazz asked, flabbergasted. "Because it seems like kind of a bad time to be doin' that, especially when we got Megatron on the other end of the line."

"**That's enough**," Prime asserted firmly, loudly, putting his proverbial foot down. The other Autobots went silent; Optimus rarely had to take a commanding tone, but by the sound of his voice and the weight of his EMF, it wasn't hard to tell that he was in serious business mode now.

"Shiftlock, open communications for all Decepticons aboard the Nemesis," Prime requested.

_*Uh, sure, just a moment,*_ Shiftlock replied, still a bit cowed. *_Dave, could you do that?*_

_*S-sure,*_ the Vehicon answered, a bit overwhelmed by Optimus' presence as well.

Slowly cycling heat and tenseness out of his internal mechanisms, Optimus Prime steeled himself for the task ahead. What he was about to say would end an era, and turn the pages of Cybertronian history. He was not given to prayer, but silently he wished with all his spark that if Primus was not beyond the reach of his children, that some small divine act of mercy would be shown to all of them on this day.

"To all who call themselves Decepticons: This is Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots. As of the date and time of this transmission, I am declaring the war between our two sides** over**."

"On my authority as the last of the Primes, I am granting asylum to all Decepticons - to all Cybertronians - who wish to end this conflict here and now. The war has cost us our homeworld, our friends, our families. It has nearly caused our very extinction."

"It is time for us put aside our differences and rebuild, if we wish to have any hope of our species' survival. Decepticons, you have no options left to you but surrender. We do not desire to be your masters, and we never have; the days of the oppression of the senate and the caste system are long over. The freedom you sought from tyranny has arrived; victory is here for both Autobot and Decepticon alike, if we are willing to cease this now pointless, destructive war, and face the greater struggle of finding a way to restore our home."

"Those Decepticons who choose to end the conflict will be granted unconditional pardon if they are willing to lay aside revenge and violence to work alongside us in peace. Any who continue to try to carry on the war will no longer be granted mercy of any kind. If you wish to keep fighting, you will have to do it alone, and against far superior numbers."

"Whether Autobot or Decepticon, a choice now lies before us all: Peace as Cybertronians, or extinction as warring armies. Choose wisely."

* * *

**AND SO IT ENDS.**

** ... Or is the real story just beginning?**


End file.
